


Green and Blue

by carriecmoney



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Human, F/M, Gen, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-10-04
Updated: 2014-01-12
Packaged: 2017-12-28 08:57:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 54
Words: 34,914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/990163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carriecmoney/pseuds/carriecmoney
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You're my passion, you're my reason, you're my song." High school!AU</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Rule Three

**Rule Three**

It was past two in the morning, and the Friday night party at Antonio’s parentless house had dwindled down to the group playing spin the empty vodka bottle and pass around the emptying tequila bottle in the sunroom. The wicker furniture had been pushed back or outside onto the porch, and all fifteen teenagers were fighting off exhaustion and the sourer effects of their inebriation. They had been playing for hours, and everyone in the circle had kissed at least everyone else’s cheek, if not mouth, at some point that night – some of them needing more liquor persuasion than others.

Well, most everyone.

Gilbert, a rambunctious albino, let out a bark of victorious laughter when the spin of the blond boy with glasses pressed against his left side pointed to himself. Before the blond had a chance to think, Gilbert grabbed his face and gave him an overplayed smack, complete with smacking noise. The blond shook his head out and giggled. “Thanks, Gil.”

Gil grinned. “No prob, Mattie.” He reached for the bottle and spun it as best as his inhibited motor skills would let him. “Come on, gimme a chick,” he pleaded, earning too-loud laughter from the circle. It stopped just shy of a girl with long pale hair on a scowling, barefoot boy.

He jolted out of his glaring at the floor when he realized Gil and his evil smirk were approaching. “No, no! I chicken, I chicken!” he said quickly, holding his hands up in defense. Gil wrinkled his nose at him, plopping back down in more of a sprawl across his spot and Matt’s lap than anything else. “You’re no fun, Arthur. Now strip.”

Grumbling about stupid people and stupid rules of stupid games, Arthur was forced to follow the second of the three rules of their version of the game. (Rule One was that the two people selected by The Bottle had to kiss or chicken. Rule Two was that the person who chickened out had to take off an article of clothing. Rule Three was any pair who got picked more than five times had to go to The Closet.) He pulled off his shirt to the whistles of the girls and the jibes of the guys, then studiously ignored everyone’s eyes as he stretched forward to spin the bottle.

‘ _Please don’t land on Alfred, please don’t land on Alfred_ ,’ he chanted in his head (and maybe a little out loud, it was hard to tell at this point), taking the tequila bottle from Ivan on his left, throwing back a mouthful, and passing it on to Natalia without taking his eyes off the spinning bottle. He and Alfred had been matched five times already, and he didn’t want to face that gray area of attraction versus friendship that they were stuck in when he was drunk and slightly horny. It certainly didn’t help that Alfred’s usual fake flirting seemed to get more and more intense as the night wore on.

When it finally stopped, it was pointing at the sunny-skinned jock for the sixth time that night. Arthur stared at a widely grinning Alfred in dumb shock as his fate stretched out before him.

You couldn’t chicken out of Rule Three.

Their ‘friends’ were cold and merciless, cracking jokes and laughing uncontrollably as they were pushed to their feet by their neighbors in the circle and shoved out of the room - Arthur by Ivan, who was far too big to still be in high school, and Alfred by Bridget and Maddie, both ‘sexually active’ and the main sponsors of the more daring exploits of the last few hours. Ivan held open the door of the coat closet (the coats themselves had been thrown into the hallway so that there would at least be standing room for two people) while Maddie and Bridget shoved the two boys inside. Ivan slammed and barricaded the door behind them, plunging them into darkness and silence.

“Get off my bloody shin, you idiot,” Arthur hissed, kicking at the knee or elbow digging into his calf. The Closet wasn’t big enough for two seventeen year old boys to sit down, and various pieces of junk poked at and fell on them as they tried to untangle their legs in the dark.

“Ow! Watch your nails!”

“Don’t _touch_ me! Your hands are fucking _freezing_!”

“Well stop feeling me up with your feet!”

After a short but vicious struggle, they gave up trying to stand, resigning themselves to being hopelessly knotted together and cramped into a space that was more appropriate for one person a decade younger than them. Arthur ended up with his feet resting on Alfred’s abdomen, one of Alfred’s legs folded beneath them at an uncomfortable angle while the other was caught between Arthur’s, cowboy boot propped against the wall behind Arthur’s back.

There was a _thunk_ from Alfred’s direction. “My head hurts.”

“Gee, I wonder.”

“You could kiss it and make it better?”

Arthur groaned, burying his face in his hands. This was exactly why he had avoided any sort of contact with Alfred – not just during the game, but for the past few weeks. For some odd reason, whenever they were near each other, Alfred had taken to hitting on him relentlessly. Arthur was too confused by sorting out his sexual orientation and the mixed messages Alfred gave off to do anything but get flustered and run away. He really didn’t _want_ to know what had made Alfred switch from being just another guy in their circle of friends to becoming this flirtatious, ridiculous, _far too close_ … thing. However, it seemed like he had no choice but to find out now.

Alfred tried to shift away from the tennis racket at his back and failed. “So.”

“So what?”

“ ‘Well now what?’ so what.”

“We sit here and ignore each other for seven minutes?”

“You’re funny.” He grasped Arthur’s ankles, then trailed his hands up the side of his legs, his touch just light enough to send Arthur gasping and shivering, and resettled them just above his knees. He lifted his legs apart and up so he could extract his own leg from between them, then pulled a quivering Arthur forward so he was in his lap. Arthur was speechless as Alfred leaned forward to whisper in his ear and hit just below his target, mouth ghosting over his jaw.

“We should make out.”

Alfred’s hot damp breath coated Arthur’s face, neck, and bare chest; all of the handling and the statement, combined with his drunken state, made him only able to nod along. “Yeah. Okay.” He smiled against Arthur’s cheek, then trailed his mouth across his face to ease it over Arthur’s, who responded instantly. Fuck, he just wanted physical contact, and even if it was with Alfred, he didn’t care anymore.

Arthur opened his mouth to Alfred, letting the other’s hands roam over his bare torso and feel every square inch of skin several times over. He himself was too busy running his tongue around the inside of Alfred’s teeth to protest. His touch burned and chilled him, and Arthur trembled, rutting against Alfred’s stomach unconsciously as his kissing pace sped up, getting sloppier and wetter. Alfred moaned into him, hands diving into the back of Arthur’s jeans and pulling him even closer. Arthur tried to wrap his legs around his waist, but was thwarted by the clutter of The Closet. Alfred arched forward to give him room, and Arthur gasped and withdrew his tongue as the action brought Alfred’s erection to his attention. He grinned down at him, even though he knew the other couldn’t see it.

“Happy to see me, love?” he asked, running his fingers through soft hair. Hot breath blew across his face as Al panted under him.

“Shut up,” he said when he could think, giving Arthur’s ass a squeeze in revenge. “It’s not like you’re any better.”

Arthur’s face burned, but instead of keeping up the banter, he found Al’s mouth with his own again so he could bite down on his bottom lip. Al groaned – in pain or desire, it was hard to tell – and pulled his lip away to suck at Arthur’s neck. Arthur clutched broad shoulders and tipped his head back.

If he had been in a more rational state of mind, Arthur probably would have been asking questions, like ‘why’ and ‘what the hell is going on’, but he wasn’t, so he didn’t. All he could do was dig his nails into his shoulders and grind his hips in time with Alfred as his skin was tasted.

Alfred leaned forward a little too much trying to reach lower on Arthur’s chest and lost his balance, tipping forward and banging both their heads on the opposite wall. Arthur cursed and Alfred laughed, shifting into a crouch over him. A sliver of light came through the crack under the door, tinting the left side of Arthur a slight blue and monochrome. His eyes were half-closed and fluttering, and spotty, rectangular bruises were already forming along his neck and shoulder.

“I’m not going to remember this tomorrow,” Alfred stated. Arthur raised his impressive eyebrows.

“Even if you could, would you want to?” he asked, avoiding eye contact in favor of watching his hands run over Alfred’s thin undershirt.

He bent down and kissed him, cheek to mouth to cheek. “ ‘Course I would!” Arthur’s eyes snapped wide. “I mean, I’ve only been trying to get in your pants for, like, two _months_ now.”

Arthur’s eyebrows drew together, and Alfred kissed them. Now that he’d had a taste, he wanted to kiss every part of Arthur. He felt his intake of breath on his neck.

“You mean, all that – you were fucking _serious_?” he asked, stunned. Alfred laughed.

“Bet your bottom dollar and hope to die,” he swore, drawing an X on Arthur’s chest.

Arthur huffed. “Well shit.” He reached up and pulled Alfred’s grinning face down to his. “You’re _not_ going to forget this in the morning. I’ll make sure of it,” he said, lips close enough to Alfred’s to brush them while he talked.

Alfred shivered. “Stop being so damn hot,” he whispered before closing the distance, nose pressed into Arthur’s wet cheek and moaning.

* * *

“How long’s it been since we threw those two in The Closet, anyway?” Mathias asked as he spun the bottle after getting a kiss from a very giggly Mei. The others shrugged.

“Long enough, probably,” Francis said, checking his watch even though he couldn’t focus his eyes enough to read the hands. “Who wants to let them out?”

A brief silence. “I will,” Elizaveta volunteered, standing up and wobbling a little on her feet before stumbling out into the hallway. She ran a hand along the wall to steady herself and clutched the chair that was propped under the doorknob, and was about to yell through the door when she heard _it_.

It, of course, being the pants and moans of two people obviously engaged in some risky business.

She giggled, listening for a moment to the bumps and name cryings coming from the crack under the door, and decided to leave them be. She turned back to the sunroom, tripping over one of the coats on the floor on the way but recovering nicely, and kept giggling until she sat back down next to the very busty Katyusha, who had been forced to strip down to her bra while she was gone.

After she had made sure she was sitting properly, she looked up at the curious circle. “I don’t think we’ll be using that closet anymore,” she said, hiccupping and trying to rub the heat from her cheeks.

Life was certainly good tonight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> {A/N: You might recognize this fic. That's because it just got deleted off of ff.net, so it kicked me in the butt to get it up on here. I'll be posting a chapter every day or so until this is caught up.}


	2. Soul On Fire

**Soul On Fire**

Alfred may not remember the date, but he can tell you the time, season, situation, and location of the first time he realized he might not be as straight as he thought.

It was sometime after midnight during Christmas break, and they had two cars and twelve teenagers grouped to wander the suburbs, nothing but a waste of gas. He was sharing the backseat of a Civic with three boys and a girl, shotgun already called by Bridget. Gilbert was driving, Francis at the wheel of the other car as they raced down a back highway; Bridget shrieked and urged him on. In the back, Alfred stretched his arm along the back of the seat, Arthur on one side and the door on the other. His brother was mirroring his position on the other side, but he’d lucked out, getting cute and clueless Mei to sit next to. She was leaning back into his scrawny shoulder; Al stuck his tongue out at him when they made eye contact.

A sudden left turn had all of them falling towards him, and they cursed and laughed as Gil cackled maniacally and cut Francis off.

When they won against physics and straightened back up, Arthur was pressed all along his side and suddenly Alfred couldn’t think of anything else.

The car bumped and Arthur’s head knocked against his shoulder; their near legs were forced together from hip to knee, setting fire to Alfred’s skin; through the leather of his bomber jacket, Arthur’s body leaned into him.

He glanced down at his face, but he could only see flyaway hair and the bridge of his nose from this angle.

Arthur sighed, and he _felt_ it.

Alfred turned his head away and pressed his burning cheek to the ice-cold window, staring at the houses and trees flying by and trying not to think about Arthur, close and there and only some cotton and leather between them-

Oh, he was now thoroughly _fucked_.


	3. Sweet Southern Moon

**Sweet Southern Moon**

Alfred killed the engine and the headlights of his and his brother’s pickup, the noise of the blaring radio suddenly cutting off into trailing laughter and chirping crickets. Arthur grabbed the six-pack off the floor and they tumbled out of the car, muddy to the ankle after just a few steps in the torn-up meadow in the woods. Arthur was bare-footed, having been pulled out of his bedroom window by an overeager Alfred barely half an hour ago, so it wasn’t long before Al noticed his slow, tentative steps and offered his back as a ride.

The six-pack clinked against Alfred’s chest where Arthur had slung his arms over his shoulders as they crossed the meadow to the only reliably not-muddy spot under a towering magnolia tree. When they got there, Al carefully let Arthur back to his feet, even if he really just wanted to throw him down on the ground there.

If he did that, though, they’d crush the beer.

They sat down where they stood, thighs touching and ankles twisted together, and shared the first can, passing it back and forth with only a few sighs for conversation.

“Nice out tonight,” Alfred said, opening the next can. Arthur grunted in answer, leaning against his side. Al smiled and wrapped his arm around Arthur’s waist. “Not as nice as you, o’course.”

“Shut up.” Al laughed and rested his head on top of Arthur’s, rocking them back and forth slightly with the grass in the breeze.

It took them longer to finish the next can, but when Arthur drained the last drop and crushed it on the ground, he shoved himself off the ground to straddle Al’s lap, crossing his wrists behind his head. “You should kiss me now,” he said, and Alfred grinned and complied. They attacked each other’s mouths almost viciously, and Alfred fell back in the grass, hands restless along Arthur’s back as Arthur’s cupped the back of his head to keep it from banging against a tree root with every movement.

Soon, they were pulling at clothes and panting hard, Arthur’s pajamas shed quickly as Alfred sat up just enough to shuck off his T-shirt and use it as a blanket beneath his bare back before he pulled Arthur back down on top of him, who was now only wearing his boxers and a flush.

“Are we going to do this right now?” Al panted between kisses, hands gleefully exploring the bare skin of Arthur’s back, keeping it warm in the summer humidity.

Arthur grunted, nodded. “Shit, Al, if we don’t fuck now we never will,” he said, and Al snorted a laugh.

They made out for several more moments, content for the time being to rut and kiss and moan. Al dragged Arthur away from his mouth with a hard brush over his cheek. “How are we going to do this?”

Arthur blinked at him. “I have no fucking idea.”

Alfred smiled and kissed his forehead. “I think we’re supposed to have lube or lotion or something if we wanna do it right,” he murmured. “And, well, I’ve never exactly had to get that before, so…”

“Honestly, neither have I.” Arthur started laughing, head falling into Al’s chest. “God, we’re such fuckups that we can’t even fuck.”

Al chuckled, and his hands slid down to grope Arthur’s ass. “So what do we do?”

Arthur took a deep breath of Alfred, then pushed back so he could look at him in the face. “I have an idea, but you have to promise not to laugh if I fail miserably.” Al leaned up and kissed him briefly.

“Of course! I’d never laugh at you with something like this on the line.” He grinned at him, and Arthur cleared his throat.

“You better hold to that.” He kissed him again – neither of them would admit that their favorite part of this relationship was the kissing – and scooted back down Alfred’s body, straddling his calves and _oh sweet Jesus was that his idea?_

Arthur moved quickly, businesslike to fight his awkwardness, and unzipped Alfred’s jeans and pushed down the elastic of his boxers. “Could you, ah, lift your hips for a moment?” he asked, face red and turned away from Al’s.

“Uh, oh yeah, sure.” He held his hips off the ground enough for Arthur to slide his pants and underwear around his ass, and bare skin on grass felt fucking _weird,_ but who cared because Arthur bent down and held him in one hand and _licked_ him.

“Oh fucking hell,” he breathed, hips bucking involuntarily, and Arthur slammed his free arm across them to hold them still.

“ _No moving_.” Al gulped at the tone and willed his abdominal muscles still, but it was so hard when Arthur went back to his taste test, pressing kisses between licks. Al tried to hold onto the ground with one hand while the other went instinctively to the back of Arthur’s head, gripping his hair and startling him away from Alfred’s cock.

“Sorry, sorry, _God_ , keep going,” Alfred panted, eyes closed and head thrown back. Arthur took a deep breath and kissed the tip, closed his eyes, took it into his mouth.

Alfred gasped with a wince. “ _Ow teeth ow teeth ow teeth_.” Arthur drew back instantly, flustered.

“Sorry, sorry.” He chewed on his lips before wrapping them over his teeth, feeling stupid for it, but when he tried again the only tinge to Alfred’s gasp was a startled choke of lust. He pushed a little at the back of Arthur’s head, and Arthur’s eyes flew open in surprise and all he could see was skin and short dark hair and he suddenly needed to know this was actually Alfred’s cock in his mouth.

He sat back and lay forward across Alfred suddenly, holding his face in both hands until those blue eyes opened. “I’m not sure I can do it,” he admitted, heart hammering in his chest. Alfred blinked at him as the words cut through his arousal; when their meaning registered, he smiled softly, a little dopily.

“Hey, that’s okay, we can do something else,” he said, running a hand through Arthur’s sweaty hair. Arthur sighed and kissed him, head almost completely to the side so their mouths fit the best.

“Has anyone ever told you that you’re perfect?” Arthur asked after the kiss, rubbing his cheek along Alfred’s, who laughed a little shrilly.

“Only you, honeydoll.” Arthur made a face at the nickname, but he let it slide since they were trying to have sex.

“So should we just… try it without lube or something?” Arthur asked, taking a moment to absorb the feel of Alfred’s body laid out beneath him.

Al frowned. “All of my research said that no, that was a bad idea.”

Arthur giggled. “How much did you research?” Al grinned sheepishly.

“Well I had to make sure that this gay thing wasn’t just a phase, or a fluke with you.” Arthur’s fingers tightened.

“And?”

Al shrugged. “I think I like you the most, no matter what, but as a whole, guys? Not a big thing for me.” Arthur sighed and settled against him. Alfred’s arms hugged him close.

“Maybe we should start this over.”

“Yeah, that sounds good.”

This time, Alfred flipped them over, setting Arthur back on his bunched-up T-shirt and lifting one of his legs by the ankle, kissing a line along the inside of his leg until the hem of his boxers. He pulled at the skin there with his teeth, making Arthur gasp and leaving a hickey in a place only he would see for certain.

He let the leg fall down around his waist and leaned forward over a once again flustered Arthur, grinning down at him. “Doesn’t take much to get you up, does it?”

“Oh, shove it and get on with it,” Arthur snapped, slapping one of his arms. Al wrinkled his nose at him before leaning down to kiss away his prickly, quickly trailing away down the side of his face, his neck, his collarbone, where he left another intentional hickey, before getting to Arthur’s chest.

He shifted his weight to one hand for a moment and rubbed a thumb over Arthur’s nipple in experimentation, just to see what it did for a guy. Arthur hummed and smiled, arching into the hand. Al grinned devilishly and went back on both hands, ignoring Arthur’s weak protests until he bent down to tug at the same nipple with his teeth.

The protests turned to a small ‘ _oh_.’ He arched up more into Alfred’s mouth, running his hands over Al’s arms, shoulders, back down. Alfred treated it like a kiss for a lack of another model, and the moans he worked out of Arthur were _delicious_. He winced a little at the fingernails in his wrists, but ignored it for now in favor of switching to the other one. Arthur was panting now, one hand in Al’s hair while the other clutched his forearm for balance. He looped his leg around the outside of Alfred’s, holding him close and bucking their hips together. Al hissed and backed away, moving up to stare down at Arthur, who opened his eyes lazily and smiled up at him.

“Whoever invented foreplay was a fucking _genius_ ,” he swore between pants. Al laughed and kissed him. It took about five seconds for it to get back to raunchy, and Arthur broke away with a gasp.

“Are you _quite sure_ you don’t have some kind of lubrication somewhere?” Arthur panted, sounding much more composed than he felt.

Al paused where he’d been mouthing his neck. “I guess I should go check my car.”

“Yes, yes you should.” Al smiled and kissed his mouth, pulled his legs up folded under him, kissed him again. “Hang on a sec, ‘kay?” Arthur grunted and held Al’s face down for one more kiss, then pushed him toward the truck parked on the other side of the field. Al laughed, buttoned up his pants again and ran, leaving Arthur cold and alone and very aware that they were having sex in the woods in the dark. He leaned over and took another beer, popping it open and draining a third of it in one gulp.

A whoop of triumph pulled him from his alcoholic reverie, and he looked up to see Al’s silhouette holding up something before he slammed the door shut and cut off the cab light. He ran back, falling over the lumps in the ground under the grass, and control-fell over Arthur, landing with hands by his hips and blue eyes an inch from Arthur’s. “Found this.” He showed Arthur the never-used tube of hand lotion that seemed suspiciously motherly. “Think it’ll do?”

“At this point, anything would suffice,” Arthur said, setting the beer as far away as he could reach. “Now, more importantly, do you know what to do with it?”

Al blushed. “Well, I did do that research.”

Arthur laughed with him and kissed him, gripping his neck and humming into it. When they broke away, Arthur was on his back again, and Al was blushing worse.

“So, do you…” He swallowed. “Which way would you like?”

Arthur cleared his throat, looked away, looked back. He kept those eyes and carded his fingers through slightly shaggy gold hair.

“Well, I… honestly, I’ve always been curious how it would feel to- to take so…” His face was bright red by now, the same as Al’s, and he didn’t finish his sentence. Alfred nodded anyway.

“Okay… okay.” He sat back and stripped Arthur completely, straightening out the T-shirt blanket under him before lifting Arthur’s leg to hook over his shoulder again, pushing the other one to the side and Arthur shivered. He had a small addiction to Alfred’s manhandling on a normal day, and this was far from a normal day.

“Tell me when it hurts, okay?” Al said, gazing at Arthur with unsure eyes, and he nodded furiously, mouthing words that couldn’t come out. Al ducked his head, kissed the knee at his shoulder as he squeezed out lotion on his fingers and spread it around three of them, sticking out his tongue a little and furrowing his eyebrows in concentration as he circled Arthur’s entrance with them. Arthur sucked in a breath and _this was really happening_. He tilted his head back and closed his eyes, letting the feeling take over. A small, barely said ‘Okay,’ and Al pushed a finger in slowly, and suddenly Arthur was glad Al never listened to him when he told him to stop biting his nails. He scrambled for a part of Alfred to hold, found his knee, still in his jeans, and dug his fingers in.

“You okay?”

Arthur nodded. “Just keep going.” Al nodded slightly against his knee and pushed the finger in as far as it would go, swirled it in an increasing spiral. Arthur was breathing too fast, and Al kissed his knee again.

“Honey, just relax, it’s just me,” he soothed, rubbing his cheek over Arthur’s skin.

“Please, just- just keep talking, please.”

Al smiled, turned his mouth back into Arthur’s skin as he kept stretching with the one finger. “You’re doing great, better than I’d do right now. Hell, I’d probably be crying like a bitch right now.” He drank in the sight of Arthur, bent back in front of him, slightly sweaty and _his_. “You’re perfect, you’re wonderful, you’re… you’re _mine_ , and that’s all that matters.” Arthur sighed, releasing most of the tension coiled in his muscles in a breath. “Feel better?”

“Mmm.” Arthur rolled his head up to look through half-open eyes at Al. “You can add another, I think.”

“All right.” He took out his hand, came back in with two fingers. This time, he started murmuring Arthur’s praises instantly, scissoring and stretching and _looking_.

Arthur was a puddle before, and then Al’s fingers hit _something_ and his eyes flew open, his back arched, and he almost tore a hole in Alfred’s jeans. “Holy _fucking Christ_ what was _that_.” Al chuckled, nipped at the patch of skin he’d been abusing.

“Come on, you’re not dumb.” He pressed down on it, massaged into it, and Arthur couldn’t breathe in a good way, nodded automatically when Al asked if he could add another finger.

This was better than he’d thought, even if it was kind of uncomfortable and painful when it wasn’t gorgeous and breathtaking, when he remembered that he really did love the boy that had his fingers up his fucking ass. He wasn’t sure how much he needed to be stretched to fit a cock in him, but three fingers should be about enough, right?

When he stopped feeling the pain under the rest, he raised his head a little, tapped Alfred’s thigh with his hand for his attention. “Okay, go for it.” He smiled weakly, and Al gulped, all pretenses of confidence gone.

“Yeah, all right.” He pulled his hand out, looked at his fingers, saw swirls of blood on them. “ _Shit-_ Art, you’re bleeding!” Arthur blinked and pushed himself up on his elbows, leg falling off Al’s shoulder in the process.

“Well, so I am.” He smiled up at Al, holding in small tremors of laughter. He was too high on endorphins and lust to care too much about a little blood in an awkward place. “Didn’t your research tell you that happens?”

Al blushed furiously. “It wasn’t that kind of research.” Arthur let out one of his laugh tremors, then pushed himself all the way up and onto Alfred’s lap, tilting Al’s head back with a forceful hand through hair and kissing him harshly. When Al’s eyes slipped closed and his hands settled at his hips, Arthur pulled away.

“I don’t recall telling you to stop.” Alfred blinked up at him, and he felt him shudder against him.

“Shit- okay, okay.” He laid Arthur back down for a moment so he could worm out of his jeans and underwear, kneeling first, then falling back on his ass and pulling off his shoes, throwing them to the side, tugging off his pants completely. Arthur watched the strip show with a little smirk, enjoying the sight of his rather fit boyfriend in nothing but his socks.

Al swung back up to a sitting position and knelt, taking Arthur’s hand and pulling him back onto his lap. “You’ll tell me if it hurts, right?” Arthur laughed a little desperately and hugged Al close, pressing his face against his neck.

“Love, it’s going to hurt, but I’ll be okay.” Al nodded slightly, then more surely against his shoulder.

“All right, here goes.” He spread Arthur’s knees as far as they would go on either side of him while Arthur rose a little, mouth even with Al’s temple and he pressed his mouth to it. Al held his cock steady, wrapping the other arm around Arthur’s torso. “Ready?”

“For God’s sake, Alfred, don’t make me do this myself-” His snap turned into a sharp gasp as Alfred lowered him down, and this was scary and new and didn’t feel very good yet but _they were finally doing it_.

Arthur closed his eyes and sank down slowly, digging his fingernails into Alfred’s skin in time. It hurt like a bitch, yeah, but he could already tell that would go away when he got used to it. His head fell forward to rest on Alfred’s shoulder, listening to his quick breath at his ear and holding him close. Alfred rubbed a hand up and down his back, asked, “You doin’ okay, sugar?” with a strain in his voice, and God above, Arthur _loved_ this boy.

He didn’t say that. He just nodded, rolled his hips. Alfred sighed and thrust up lightly to meet him, moving automatically and Arthur was thinking in grunts and gasps, skin filled with a natural disaster.

“Can I-”

“ _Yes_ , Christ Almighty-” Alfred cut him off with a kiss and started to move, clumsy at first, of course, of course, but all of that football had to mean something. He moved Arthur easily on his lap, and even if he brought him too high and slipped out accidentally a few times, they’d just laugh into each other’s mouths and try again.

Arthur started to move on his own when it didn’t hurt anymore, still taking it slow and easy, if not a little shallow. Then, he steeled himself and slammed down hard, past where he was stretched, really, and he could _tell_ and that was weird as fuck but it also found his prostate again and Al moaned around his tongue. He gasped in a stutter, and Al laid him back between his knees, lifted Arthur’s onto his shoulders, and grinned down at him through sweaty hair before he leaned forward and thrust in harsh again.

Arthur gave a half-voiced scream, fingers digging in the dirt as he tried to find leverage, any leverage, to help because this still hurt again, but the good outshone the pain and Alfred was coming already, hot heat in him. Arthur gasped again, this time in shock, before the wind was knocked out of him by Al collapsing over him. He winced at the strain in his hamstrings and shifted his legs down Alfred’s arms a little, Al’s abdomen pressed along his own still hard cock and panting in his ear.

“That was _awesome_ ,” he laughed, and Arthur was too close to smile.

“Yeah whatever now _help me finish_.”

Alfred blinked twice and let out a small ‘oh’ before pushing himself up a little, slipping out on the way, and looking down Arthur’s torso, too sated for embarrassment. “Right.” He shifted his weight and wrapped a hand around Arthur’s cock, jerking him off and it didn’t take much before Arthur’s eyes flew open and he arched up into his orgasm.

When he stopped moaning, Al rolled to the side, half on top of him still, and pulled him close, resting his head on Arthur’s chest. “Well, that was fun.” Arthur hummed in agreement, smiling blissfully. They laid like that until the afterglow faded enough that they could feel the ground under them again, then sat up and started getting somewhat dressed again.

Out of nowhere, Al started giggling madly, folding in on himself with his jeans halfway up his legs. Arthur looked up at him from under the shirt he was in the middle of pulling over his head.

“What on Earth are you laughing about?”

Al wiped a tear from his eye with the heel of his hand. “I told my parents I was taking you to a movie.” Arthur blinked, bit his lip, and started laughing with him, making Alfred only laugh harder. When they could pull themselves together, they both stood up and smiled at each other. “Some movie, huh?”

Arthur shuddered in suppressed laughter again. Alfred grinned, grabbed the front of his shirt, and pulled him in for a kiss. Arthur sighed and wrapped his arms around Al’s neck, closing his eyes and opening his mouth. Al pulled away slightly, still touching, and said, “It took a little while to start up, but by the middle, it was really good.”

Arthur chuckled. “I think I liked the ending best, myself.” Al grinned and kissed him again.

“Me too.” He picked Arthur up bridal-style, kissing him through the squawking protests. “Come on, let’s go home and clean up.”

Arthur smiled at him. “I think you’re forgetting a few things.” Al tilted his head in question, then looked down at the ground to see his shoes and the remnants of the six pack still on the ground. He rolled his eyes and put Arthur down so he could shove his shoes back on, but threw him over his shoulder and ran for the car, laughing and leaving the beer for the next teenaged couple to find.


	4. Crashes

**Crashes**

It was late at night when Alfred shrieked and almost jumped out of his skin at a rock hitting his window.

He fell off his bed and crashed onto a pile of textbooks painfully, Xbox controller ripping out of the machine, then scrambled up and peered over his bed as the second one hit. Carefully, he crawled around his bed, watching the window for a monster’s face or worse, the video game’s soundtrack not helping as his character, suddenly motionless, was pounced on by the living dead. He looked over his windowsill; nothing on the roof. He stood up a little to see the ground a story below and found Arthur standing there, arms crossed and foot tapping.

Al’s fear vanished, replaced with a grin as he opened his window. He leaned out, bracing his hands on the roof, and called quietly, “Heya, Art! What’s up?”

“Don’t yell, you’ll wake everyone,” Arthur snapped. “Let me in.”

Al laughed quietly. “Sure thing.” He left his window and turned off his Xbox, creeping down the edge of the stairs and padding through the kitchen to the back door, sliding the dead bolt to let a scowling Arthur in.

Al had seen these signs before and knew that Arthur had gotten in another stupid fight with his mother or father or one of his brothers and left. He’d steal one of his dad’s collection of beers –

“Why doesn’t your dad buy imports?”

-dig through his fruit basket for a banana-

“Your mum _always_ buys them half green, for the love of Christ-”

-and then grumble to himself all the way up to Al’s room.

They flopped down on his messy double bed together, Arthur sitting at the foot of it so he could eat and drink without spilling, Al stretched out across the rest. He let him grumble and eat his snack in peace. When he twisted open the Newcastle with his palm and started to chug, though, he propped himself on one hand and raised his eyebrows at him. “So… you wanna talk about it?”

“Not in particular.” Which meant _yes, after prodding_ in Arthurspeak.

Al sighed and stood up slowly, moving to his pile of clothes to find sort-of clean pajamas for Arthur, who was still in jeans. “Really now.” Arthur accepted the XXL shirt and basketball shorts, setting his half-finished beer on the floor as he changed.

“Well, if you really want to hear about it…”

“You’d tell me at some point anyway,” Al said with a shit-eating grin. Arthur scowled at him and stood up to change pants.

He finished changing and crashed face-down on the bed, groaning into the pillow. “ _Life sucks_.” Al reached over and patted his head awkwardly.

“I’m sorry you feel that way.” Arthur groaned again and rolled over, then sat up and reached for his beer again.

“The day I convince then I’m not a fucking layabout is the day that I die,” he said, and Al understood at last. He’d been at the receiving end of enough rants about how Arthur’s parents believed that because his brothers were the deadest deadbeats to ever deadbeat that Arthur was headed the same way, even though if they bothered to ask his friends they’d know it was the exact opposite. Either way, it resulted in lots of shouting and lots of Arthur storming out and crashing with Al, who lived the closest of their friends, being just down the street. Al’s parents didn’t mind as long as they didn’t get woken up by his arrival.

Al grinned at him. “You just gotta prove ‘em wrong and not give ‘em any of your money when they’re old!” Arthur tried to smile back, but it didn’t really work. Instead, he drained his beer and threw the bottle under Al’s bed and set the peel on his nightstand to rot, then flopped back face first on Al’s other pillow. Al rolled his eyes affectionately and squirmed under the covers, stretching over to turn off the lamp.

“G’night, Arthur,” he said softly. A grunt from the other side, then silence.

When he was about to nod off, he was jerked awake by an even smaller “Thank you.” He smiled in the dark.

“Sure thing, buddy.”


	5. Throws My Spirit

**Throws My Spirit**

Like many thing in his life, Arthur was very vocal in his disapproval of the latest spontaneous activity of his group of friends.

“This is _completely improper_ ,” he grumbled, leaning against a large tree growing on the banks of a small pond, hidden from the interstate by a narrow strip of woodland. He was turned away from the water as the five other boys stripped behind him, arms crossed tightly over his chest.

“Aw, c’mon, Artie, stop actin’ like my grandpa,” Gil jeered, chucking a handful of acorns at Arthur’s back as he carefully tucked his socks into his shoes with the other hand. Only one hit its target, but that was enough for Arthur to whip around and peg him in the forehead with a pinecone before moving around to the far side of his tree. The other boys hooted in laughter as Gil howled and clutched his forehead.

“Really, though, loosen up a bit, Art,” Alfred said, sauntering up and leaning one bare forearm above where Arthur’s head had just been, only in his flip-flops. The other four didn’t wait, wading into the pond and splashing each other with the murky pond water. “The girls aren’t here, and it’s dark anyway. It’s not like you’re gonna drown or anything.” He gave Arthur a winning smile even if he was glowering at the night-dark forest in the opposite direction. “I wouldn’t let that happen.”

When Arthur finally gave him a quizzical and skeptical look, Alfred winked. Arthur’s blush was bleached in the moonlight and shadows.

“Absolutely not,” he sniffed, turning away again. “It’s- it’s much too cold to go gallivanting about outdoors in the nude.”

Al made a face behind his back, moving his mouth in a parody of Arthur’s stiff vocabulary, then looked over his shoulder at the others. His twin brother and Gil had already started wrestling in the chest-deep water halfway to the middle of the pond, Francis and Toni cheering them on from the side.

He grinned, and Arthur didn’t see, too busy frowning at nothing; therefore, he was completely unprepared for Alfred to lift him off the ground by the waist and carry him to the water. Alfred held fast against his desperate writhing and screaming, and Arthur cursed their body differences five times over in his tumble of thoughts.

“ _Incoming!_ ” Alfred yelled when he was thigh-deep, chucking Arthur a few feet further, breaking up the friendly fight with the giant, squelching splash Arthur and his clothes made. Francis fell on Toni, he was laughing so hard; Toni was too busy trying to regain his wheezing breath to fight it.

Arthur battled the water and won, standing up and breathing heavily, water streaming down his sodden clothes and streaming from his limp hair. He glared pure green fire at Alfred, who was doubled up and crouched down, only his head and neck above the water line as he cried in hysteria.

“I will kill you, your future wife, and any children who may have the misfortune of you as a father,” he said, too furious to be flustered. He slogged his way back up to the bank, kicking Alfred over on the way. “You are _all_ dead to me.”

There were too helpless with laughter and the weight of the algae-infested water to fight Arthur’s revenge as he took off his jacket and wrung it out over their pile of clothes, then shifted through Francis’s with a wet and muddy shoe for his keys.

“I am sitting in the driver’s seat and ruining your upholstery until you assholes are finished!” he yelled back at them, stomping back to Francis’s coveted Prius and vanishing behind a Spanish moss-covered live oak, chased by their taunting laughter.


	6. It's Sad But True

**It’s Sad But True**

One of the favorite pastimes of the girls in their grade, besides Going To The Bathroom In Groups and Pokémon, was the guessing game “Which Jones Twin Is Gay?”

Because one of them definitely was. Matthew and Alfred, the twins without twin names, were both cute, blond-haired and blue-eyed, with glasses and their individual trademark sport – Matthew lacrosse, Alfred football. They’d been the secret heartthrobs of their class since the girls could remember, although not many of them could remember either of them dating anyone or even being caught with a girl from a different school or something at the movies or McDonald’s.

Around junior year, though, that changed forever when someone driving late at night saw _one_ of the twins’ golden hair kissing someone who definitely did not have boobs and a skirt.

No one knew who saw them or where the rumor began, but now all of the girls in their small Louisiana high school knew that one of the twins was batting for the other team, and bets went both ways as to which one it was. The Alfred supporters said all that football had to mean _something_ , and he’d been spending a lot of time with that weird British kid with the awesome accent outside of school doing date-ish things. However, Matthew looked the part more, since his hair was more wavy and delicate, curling around his chin, and his glasses gave a certain vulnerable air that made anyone with parental instincts want to protect him from the world. Besides, it was always the quiet ones.

Elizaveta ran a betting pool, mainly because she was bored and fascinated with the scandal, but also secretly because she’d been at the party where it all began, and so knew the truth, along with a small handful of people (mostly guys, none of whom had any idea that the girls were staking on some of their sexualities; the girls were few and easy to bribe into silence, if they even remembered they were there that night).

Not that she’d tell any of her business that, of course. It’d ruin the fun.


	7. Nobody's Saving Me Now

They’d decided that one in the morning was their hour.

It was the only time of day they felt really comfortable being with each other in public, walking around their suburban neighborhood with hands brushing, talking quietly or hiding in the gardens or trees from the odd passing car.

They were in someone’s front yard now, Alfred leaning over Arthur, who was backed against a support of an old well, now a decoration covered with ivy and pink roses. He had his back to the road and head ducked down, arms braced on the sides of the well by Arthur’s legs, so all any wandering eyes would see through the leaves of the hydrangeas was the brown of his leather jacket.

They both held their breath as the car went by, looking at the road from the corner of their eyes. When it passed and they sighed, they looked at each other half a foot away, stopped breathing again. Started giggling.

“We’re such fools,” Arthur said. Al grinned and took a step forward, holding the roof of the well in one hand and leaning in. Arthur smiled and pushed forward to kiss him, hands tucking into his waistband and holding him close.

Arthur had taught him a lot about kissing in the few months they’d been dating. He slid the hand on the wall up Arthur’s thigh and under his shirt, drawing circles into his side with touches too hard to tickle. Arthur’s thumbnails traced the lines of his hipbones slowly as he opened his mouth to Al’s, tilting his head to the side and leaning back completely against the well support. Al took another small step forward so he could feel the lines of Arthur all over, the roof shingles digging into his palm as he gripped everything harder, riding a wave of want flowing through him. Arthur just kept kissing him languidly, only touching his hipbones.

Al whined into his mouth, and he pulled away slowly, drawing Al’s lower lip through his teeth and smiling coyly up at him.

“Arthur, can you-” He broke off, jerking his hips forward into Arthur’s, who gasped a little, fingernails digging into Alfred’s skin. “ _Please_ ,” and he felt months of buildup in that one word, and Al flushed, looking at the creeping rose to his right, biting his lip.

Arthur rested his head on Al’s shoulder, kissing his neck, _not looking_ as his hands slid to the front and unbuttoned both of their jeans, trailed his fingers into Al’s boxers. He’d done this before – hell, at this point, they’d done _worse_ – but something felt raw about that night, and he was too aroused to put words to it. Instead, he wrapped his hand around Alfred’s half-hard cock, shoving down the boxers with the other to pull him out fully. Al panted heavily into his scalp, bucking into it.

They were well acquainted with each other by this point, so it was with little hesitation that Arthur started to jerk him off in long, heavy strokes, his kissing turning to almost chewing until Al groaned and jerked his head back by the hair so he could kiss him for real, the hand under his shirt going down, kneading the flesh down his ass and Arthur hissed into his mouth.

The embarrassment of usual faded in the heat and Arthur rushed to push down his own pants and underwear just enough, grabbed both of them in both hands. Al’s breath hitched on a syllable, choked. Arthur let go so he could sit back on the lip of the well, ignoring the cold rock digging into awkward areas in favor of pulling Al forward to stand between his legs.

“Don’t let me fall,” he whispered into his mouth. Alfred grinned at the unsaid _‘Anymore than I have already’_ and wrapped his arms around Arthur, holding him tight and kissing the sweat from his face. Arthur went back to his previous occupation, the position a little easier now that he was  a few inches higher. He locked his ankles around Alfred’s knees, bucking into his own hands with little gasps into Al’s ear. They closed their eyes against the heat and the orgasm, coming together and early. They’re only seventeen.

When they’re collected, Arthur jumped down, pressed against Al’s front and gave him another slow, lingering kiss before pushing him away enough to bend down and wipe his hands on the grass. Alfred couldn’t resist and pinched his exposed ass with a grin, causing Arthur to yelp and shoot up, then start hitting his arm and scolding him. Al just laughed and ignored him, pulling Arthur’s pants up and buttoning them again, kissing his cheek lightly. Arthur grumbled and returned the first favor, skin flushed.

“C’mon, let’s head out before someone comes to check on the suspicious activity in their front yard,” Al said, taking his hand and pulling him towards their street. Arthur clutched his hand and smiled.


	8. Aftermath

The day after everything began was one of the oddest in Arthur’s life.

He woke up on a patio couch, cuddled to a ­ _not girl_ chest, shirtless, with a wicked hangover made worse by the sun through the glass ceiling.

He groaned and buried his face further into the chest in front of him to block it out before it hit him like a truck and his eyes snapped open to someone else’s gold-tanned skin.

Hangover.

Bare-chested Alfred.

_Shit._

He tried to scramble back, but he was between the couch and _half-naked Alfred_ and couldn’t get more than a few inches away. Alfred’s arms tightened around his waist in his sleep, pulling him back close and _oh_ that felt good- no!

“Alfred- Al, you fucking piece of shit, wake the fuck up!” he said loudly and sort of shrilly into his ear. Al moaned, yawned, tried to stretch and found one of his arms pinned under a body.

His eyes opened with the same dread that Arthur felt a moment ago and found a flushed, disorderly, equally shirtless Arthur glaring fire at him.

He screamed and fell off the couch, dragging Arthur with him accidentally, who fell mostly on top of him, effectively driving all of his screaming air from his lungs. He coughed on the floor while Arthur sat up and crossed his arms over his chest, glowering and too furious to notice how he was straddling Al’s abdomen.

“And just what do you have to say for yourself?” Arthur spat. Al rubbed his head as last night came tumbling back in a mash of images, then peered up at Arthur hovering about him, fiery and bathed in early morning sunlight and a collar of hickeys around his neck and shoulders.

He blinked a few times in shock before a broad, idiotic smile spread across his face. Arthur’s eyes narrowed dangerously, then widened as Al sat up and oh, right, he was in his lap, wasn’t he? He fell back on his hands, fumbled a little. Al caught his shoulders. “What are you- _ah!_ ” Al pressed his thumb into a bruise on his collarbone in fascination, and Arthur flinched and went a little lax, mainly held up by Al’s hands, which pulled him forward into Alfred’s chest again.

“I regret nothing,” he answered in his ear. He rolled his thumb into the bruise hard and Arthur hissed, and- _God_ , this was so different than a girl, all hard lines and bone and body hair, and he really _liked_ it.

In a distant part of the house, something crashed, followed by loud cursing. They froze.

Before they could jump away, Antonio peered in from the house and beamed at them. “You’re awake! Great! Breakfast in five!” He ran off again, and they blinked at each other for a moment, then burst out laughing, holding each other like the friends they forgot they were.

“He’s so dumb sometimes,” Alfred said through tears. Arthur hummed, resting his cheek on his shoulder.

“Were you telling the truth last night?” he asked quietly, tracing the freckles of Alfred’s upper arms.

Al shrugged. “Probably. Can’t really remember.” He felt the corner of Arthur’s frown against his skin. “if it was about me liking you, then yeah.” He held his breath and loosened his grip. Arthur didn’t run.

“That’s good, then,” he said at last, tracing freckles again. Al sighed, breath tickling down Arthur’s back.

Oh, Arthur could definitely work with this.

“Well, all righty then!” Al said happily, lifting Arthur off his lap easily and standing them both up. “C’mon, I’m starving, I bet Toni’s got something awesome in there!” He smiled at Arthur and turned to leave.

“Alfred.”

He stopped and faced Arthur. “Yea- _mmph!_ ” His eyes flew open as Arthur pulled him down by a hand looped around his neck and kissed him hard. He broke away with a smirk.

“That’s part of what you forgot about last night,” he said, licking his lips before brushing past Alfred, picking up his shirt thrown over the back of a chair and putting it on as he went out the door.

Al watched him go, then grinned like a loon and followed.


	9. Indistinguishable Moments

They were alone in Alfred’s house one afternoon, curled up in a blanket watching The History Channel together, sharing a cup of hot chocolate while it rained outside. The program was droning on about the Roman Empire’s British Isles campaigns, and Alfred asked, “Do you ever think reincarnation is true?”

Arthur gave him a weird look over his shoulder and swallowed his mouthful of cocoa. “Where the hell did that come from?”

Al shrugged and plowed on, “Like, sometimes I wonder if I was alive as a Roman soldier or something back in the day, or a Native American, or a whale, or something. Don’t you?”

Arthur sighed, leaning back into Al’s chest again so he could feel it rumble as he talked. “Your brain works in mysterious ways, love.”

Alfred laughed and buried his face in the side of Arthur’s neck. “Maybe I’ve met you before.” He felt Arthur stiffen in his arms and suck in a breath.

“Reincarnation is a silly idea,” he said stubbornly, taking another sip from their mug. Al shrugged again and hummed into his shoulder blade.

“I like it. It’s romantic.”

“Only you would use that word while learning about the Romans.”

Al grinned. “Only you would care.”


	10. You Wouldn't Mind I Call You Baby

“So, we’re dating, right?”

Arthur’s attention whipped up from his burrito and he stared, wide-eyed, at Alfred. “What?”

Al shook his hair in front of his face and crammed a tortilla chip in his mouth. “Well, we’ve been doing… _this_ for, like, two weeks now,” he explained, not looking at Arthur. “Can we call ‘this’ dating now?”

“Oh.” Arthur’s brain scrambled for his usual excuses to avoid a relationship and found nothing. They didn’t live too far away, he wasn’t about to leave the country, and he certainly didn’t feel awkward in his company.

This had never really happened before. He guessed it did deserve to be called dating.

“I suppose we are,” he said, his voice hoarse, and Al beamed before taking his first big bite of the… date so far. Arthur hadn’t even noticed he’d been picking at his food. That suddenly scared him more than anything, and he almost backtracked, backed out right there – but then, under the table, Al looped his foot around his ankle and held it there, and he ran out of reasons to protest at last.

He smiled back instead and took another bite of his burrito.


	11. Smiled 'Cause They Knew

“She’s pretty hot.”

“I dunno ‘bout tha’ dress she got.”

“Mmm, you’re right. Looks uncomfortable.”

Gil groaned and hit his head against the railing of the bridge they were people-watching from. “Good Lord Almighty, could you two _be_ any gayer?” On either side of him, Francis and Antonio laughed. “Don’t answer that, please. Save me.”

“Whaeva ya wan’, brah.” Francis, being both the oldest and a Cajun, was smoking blatantly, blowing the smoke off the side of the bridge.

Nothing about the three boys on the bridge made sense. An albino, a Cajun, and a Hispanic sounds more like a punchline than a friendship, but somehow, these three were completely at ease with each other.

“Betcha five bucks you can’t spit on a car,” Gil jeered, poking Antonio in the shoulder. He smiled.

“You’re on!” Toni hocked a loogie and held it in his mouth for a moment, waiting for a particularly shiny minivan’s approach before spitting it, catching the back corner of the roof before it got under the bridge. Gil deflated and frowned as Toni smiled vacantly at him. “So, do I win?”

“I hate you and your hand-eye coordination,” Gil grumbled, slumping down to rest his chin on his forearms.

Toni blinked in confusion. “But I didn’t use my hands.”

Francis reached over Gil’s back to pat Toni on the shoulder. “Now don’ fuss now, cher, he’s jus’ a sore losah.”

“Fuck you both.”

Francis took the last drag on his cigarette and crushed it under his heel. “Lezgit outta here.” They pushed off the bridge and wandered along the sidewalk over the bridge as Toni started telling a story about either his boyfriend or a tomato – sometimes they had trouble telling the difference, but it still made Gil laughed, head thrown back, and Francis chuckle around the filter of his next cigarette.


	12. Interlude

**Interlude**

College was fine.

They went their separate ways, hoping never to see each other again, not because of hatred, but because it’d just be too hard.

They had a few girlfriends each, made new friends. Arthur even had another boyfriend. They fell in love with other people.

They might be lying if they said they never missed each other, but they weren’t when they admitted that there were weeks, months, periods of time where they didn’t think about the other at all.

They graduated and went to work, Arthur as a publishing editor, Alfred as a civil engineer specializing in skyscrapers. Arthur played bass in a band on the side, and Al volunteered at the local fire department. They were content.

Then, Al came back to their hometown to visit his family during the same Labor Day weekend that Francis decided that it was past time to remind Arthur what real cooking was, and their first love romance came roaring back.


	13. Masochistic Sacrifice

Al would never, ever admit that he spent the night after his and Arthur’s messy breakup on the Fourth of July lying in his truck bed several miles from the middle of nowhere, alternating between crying in bursts and drinking straight from a two liter bottle of Coke.

He wasn’t close enough to civilization to see any fireworks, although he could hear the boom of them in the distance. Instead, he had the stars, the bayou wind, and carbonated caffeine as his silent companions as he played through their fight on repeat, trying to change words and cringing at himself.

They hadn’t meant for it to end this way. Hell, they didn’t _want_ it to – they’d told each other that on multiple occasions. The end had been coming, though, if not from Al’s increasing mood swings and Arthur’s increasing clinginess, then at least from sources beyond their control. They were both going to different colleges five hours from each other, Al with no one else from their class. As much as they loved each other – and they did, even the ends of the earth wouldn’t completely stop that – neither of them wanted to spoil what was going bad already by distance.

Al couldn’t lie to himself and say it was someone else’s fault, an outside influence, that caused it to blow up like it did as he counted the stars in silence there. They made him honest with himself, and he knew it was only the two of them and their goddamned pigheadedness. Well, mostly his pigheadedness. He hadn’t really _meant_ to act cold and unresponsive to Arthur, but he’d shut down into one of his moods and the atmosphere snapped so tight and this is why they should have broken up _months_ ago-

He groaned, banged his head against the metal of the truck bed a few times, then pushed himself up on an elbow to chug more Coke. It didn’t help like alcohol – but he didn’t want to know what he’d do if he got drunk tonight.

No, this was better, getting it out of his system where no one could hear him, see him, try to console him. Besides, it had to end sometime, and – well, this way wasn’t as good as any, but it would have to do.

He didn’t think Arthur wanted to see him again. He wasn’t sure he wanted to see Arthur again, either.

By the time he finished the Coke and took the long way home, he’d almost forgotten the spark of the fight and blamed it on the devil.

Almost.


	14. Sincerely

A week later, Arthur called. He hung up on the first call before it could go past the dial tone. The second time, it ran to voicemail.

“ _Alfred, answer your damned phone!_ _…_ _No, it’s okay, I probably wouldn’t, either. Look, about that fu- about last week, I’m_ _…_ _I_ …” He choked on his words. “ _I’m not sorry! Fuck you and everything you stand for! You’re a terrible, horrible person and I never want to see you ever again!_ ” A pause. “ _No, that’s a lie, you’re not-_ ”

The voicemail ran out on him. He called again.

“ _-ucking voicemail_ _–_ _what I was saying was you_ _’_ _re not a terrible person, don_ _’_ _t let anyone tell you that. You_ _’_ _re_ _…_ _you_ _’_ _re rather brilliant, actually. You-_ ” A deep breath. “ _You deserve a lot better than me. It’s probably better this way. You’re probably going to find a nice girl and have two kids and a dog and a wonderful life, so_ _…_ _good luck with that. I_ _…_ ”

The voicemail ran out again. He didn’t call back and deleted the number from his contacts, even though he’d always remember it anyway.

The next day, when Alfred had to know he would be at work, he _had_ to, he called.

“ _Yeah. Same to you._ ”


	15. Echoes of the Ghosts

**Echoes Of The Ghosts**

They remet in the canned foods aisle.

“I’m tellin’ ya, this is gonna be the Predators’ _year-_ ”

“Oh.” Alfred’s small gasp threw off Matthew’s hockey rant, and Al stopped in his tracks as he saw Francis and _Arthur_ turn into the aisle at the far end. “Well that’s not something I expected to see today.”

“Hmm?” His twin followed his gaze and raised his eyebrows.

The other two didn’t notice them at first, too busy arguing over something to see anyone else. Francis glanced forward and did a double-take.

“Tis’ll be interestin’, now.”

“What are you- oh my.” Arthur blinked as the sight of the Jones twins a few yards in front of him registered in his head. Francis and Matt, being the emotionally unaffected of the group, greeted each other like the old friends they were. Al and Arthur followed them absently, avoiding looking at the other but unable to think of anything else.

“Al and I were gettin’ stuff for our cookout tomorrow. Y’all wanna join?” Matt said, jerking both of their attentions back to the conversation.

“Soun’s good ta me, cheh,” Francis said, his Cajun accent only getting stronger and stranger with age. “Actually, Artah an’ me were shoppin’ fah dinnah ahselves-”

“More like fighting over it,” Arthur grumbled, and _wow_ , how did Alfred forget he missed that voice?

“Whaeva. Mattieu, ya betta at cookin’ tan _tis_ -” He gestured pointedly at Arthur, who hit him – “so why don’ we all gave dinnah togethah an’ all’a us catch up?”

It had been five years since Matt had last seen Arthur, but time never dulled one’s exposure to Arthur’s cooking. He quickly agreed to save them all from a forest fire or worse, ignoring his twin kicking his ankle, and joined Francis as they completely overhauled the planned menus for the night and left the other two standing awkwardly in front of each other.

“So,” Al said, looking at the floor and feeling seventeen again. “How have you been?”

“Oh, I’ve been good,” Arthur answered. “And you?”

“Pretty good, pretty good.” Al shoved his hands in his pockets to wipe his sweaty palms. “I didn’t think you liked Francis.”

“I don’t, but since my parents died, I don’t have any other reason to come back here but when he invites me over.”

Al blinked at him in surprise, looking at him for the first time since he first looked away. “Your parents died? What happened?”

“Oh- it happened a while ago, not long after- well.” He trailed off into an awkward silence. “We should probably go after them.”

“Yeah, probably, before they buy the hundred dollar mushrooms or something.” They followed the direction that Matt and Francis had disappeared to, not walking together with a vengeance.

* * *

“You just _had_ to bring out the wine, didn’t you,” Matt groaned seven hours later, burying his face in his hands and falling back against Francis’s couch. Next to him, Francis swirled the last of his own wine around in his glass and sighed.

“Lookin’ back t’was a bad move,” he admitted, “buh wha else was I gonna do? If I didn’ tey wah gonna nevah get ovah temselves.” They both glared with varying levels of intensity at the other two in their dinner group (Matt borderline furious, Francis tragically amused), who were alternating between giggling like fools and sneaking kisses on Francis’s back porch.

“Whatever, I’m ditching him,” Matt said, patience gone, and stood up with a frustrated scowl. “Make Arthur take him back home with they stop acting like lovestruck puppies.”

Francis put his hand to his heart in overplayed shock. “I dunno how you can say such tings, Mattieu! Tis is love we’re watchin’! How can ya be so insensitive?”

“Because Al’s being his selfish dick self and I want to sleep,” he said, frowning as he dug for his keys and stomped towards the front door. He paused at the door to the den and turned to Francis. “Y’all gonna join us tomorrow still?”

“A’cauhs, cheh,” Francis said, standing up as well to see him off. “An’ don’ worry if Al don’ come home tonigh’.” He winked as he held open his front door for Matthew, who shuddered at the insinuation.

“Do not ever want to think about Al having sex ever again.” He stepped out into the edge-of-the-swamp humidity and twilight. “It was nice to see ya again, though.”

Francis smiled. “Ya jus’ come by any time ya wan’ some real food, cheh. I’ll get Toni and Gil ovah here and we’ll have us a lil’ high school reunion.”

Matt grinned. “Will do, man.” A burst of loud laughter carried all the way around from the other side of the house, and he cringed again before running away to his truck.

Francis watched him go with a fond smile, then took a deep breath and braced himself to bear the suddenly re-besotted couple alone.


	16. I Wanna Be Your Last

**I Wanna Be Your Last**

It wasn’t the first time Alfred or Arthur had woken up with someone unusual in the bed with them – both of them had some interesting college stories to tell to their children one day. It was, however, the first time in a long, long while it had been with each other.

Alfred came to slowly, hugging the warm thing to his chest and twisting his legs in it, nuzzling into coarse hair and smiling at the smell – bonfire smoke and sea salt. Then he woke up with a start and jerked back a little, just enough to see the face of the person cradled against him.

Arthur’s mouth was slightly parted, and he was still very asleep, arms curled to his bare chest and fingers looped in the dogtag chain around Al’s neck, which was starting to bite into the skin at the nape of it. He bent back forward a little, although he didn’t quite dare to give into the urge to rub his hands up and down Arthur’s back. He needed to think without Arthur yelling at him, which he already knew was going to happen as soon as he woke up.

He had a killer hangover, first of all, the kind of hangover he only got with wine. That screamed Francis even more than the Spanish moss-covered forest out the window and cross-stitched poem in French hanging on the wall. Second of all, he definitely still loved Arthur. That had to factor in somewhere, even if the sex they obviously had last night was a little hazy. He remembered making out with him on the lawn chair outside, Francis guiding them like cattle to a bedroom, turning off the light, and green eyes that were the same but different looking up at him.

His ass didn’t hurt. Well, he at least could figure that he didn’t bottom last night.

Arthur shifted in his arms a little, setting Al on edge and curling in closer with a small sound, face against Al’s collarbone, still asleep.

Al took a careful breath. Oh yeah, definitely still loved him.

He let the careful breath go in a sigh, relaxing against Arthur and savoring the moment. For all he knew, it could be the last.

It took a few long, warm minutes for Arthur to stir out of sleep, then stiffen, eyes on the golden skin in front of him.

Al smiled at him and couldn’t help himself. “Mornin’, sunshine.” He kissed his forehead, and he felt Arthur shudder.

“What-” His voice cracked on morning roughness. “Oh, God.”

“That all you got to say?” Al chuckled quietly. “Must’ve been good for you, too, then.”

Arthur snorted, then laughed as well, and they were both _laughing_ so it had to be okay, right? “I can’t believe us,” Arthur said, and Al was glad the pronoun was plural. “Falling into bed the first day we see each other after five years.”

“You’d think we were horny twenty-somethings or something.” They laughed again, and Arthur’s arms slid from between them to around Al’s back, holding him just as close as Al was holding him.

They were quiet for a moment, closing their eyes against the morning light and the shine from each other.

“What’re we going to do now?” Arthur asked softly. Al’s fingers curled against his skin.

“Stay here with me,” he answered, and he felt Arthur’s eyelashes as he blinked and his breath as he gasped. “Arthur, I think I still love you, and… I think I could love you more, if you let me.”

Arthur buried his face more in his chest. “You-” He drew his head back and glared at him through a helpless smile. “That has to be the single best thing anyone’s ever said to me.”

Alfred beamed. Arthur worked a hand around to stroke his cheek, expression softening. “God, how did I ever think you were less than perfect,” he breathed, watching his hand instead of Alfred’s too blue eyes.

“So… is that a yes?”

Arthur’s eyelids fluttered close over a roll of his eyes before he pressed forward to kiss him – short, because their breath tasted like sour wine. “We can give it a try.”


	17. Could Have Been Somebody Else

They didn’t go to prom together.

Although they were going steady and not _exactly_ a secret (which meant everyone knew they were out except them), the both agreed that it’d be just a little too much for their small town. They had no desire to make headlines. Instead, they struck a deal with someone else – multiple someones.

In complete contrast to Al and Arthur’s slow, romantic experimentation of a relationship, Maddie and Bridget had been caught together more times than most of the straight couples in their school. They were the drunk party girls of their class and also completely engrossed in each other, although they never objected to company. They were loosely involved in Al and Arthur’s friend circle, enough that it wasn’t weird when Al caught them on the way out of their last class and walked them to Bridget’s car. They chatted about school, the weather, the Government test, until they got out the front door of the building and Al sighed heavily.

“I have a question for you two.” They exchanged a glance.

“Well, what is it?” Maddie asked.

Al chewed his lip and stared at the ground as they walked. “Will you go to prom with me ‘n Arthur?” They exchanged another glance, this time amused.

“Now why do you wanna do that?” Maddie asked, leaning against Bridget’s car as Bridget dug for her keys in her backpack.

“Well, see, Art’s the class prez, even if it don’t mean much, and he kind of cares about looking normal at this shindig,” he explained, playing with the straps of his backpack. “Now me, I don’t really care who I go with as long as he’s there and my date doesn’t mind me ditchin’ her, and since y’all’re in the same boat as us, well, I figured you’d mind the least out of everyone.” He smiled winningly at them. “So, whatcha say?”

Bridget unlocked her car at last, and Maddie flipped her long dark hair over her shoulder as she opened the passenger door. “Well, as long as you two buy us dinner and don’t take up in that crap truck a’yours, I’m game,” she said with a shrug. “Kitty?”

Al bit back a grin at the pet name as Bridget stood on the edge of her car to lean on the roof and smile over it at Al. “Mmm, all right, but I get you as my date,” she said with a wink. Al laughed.

“Great! Now I just gotta clear it with Art and we’ll be all set.” They giggled at him as he backed away towards his and his twin’s truck on the other side of the lot. “Thanks again!”

“Any time, Al!” Bridget called, then swung down into the driver’s seat and drove away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> {A/N: Maddie (Magdalena) is fem!Portugal and Bridget is Belgium.}


	18. Never Go Away

“Let’s go see a movie.”

Matt looked up from his computer to see his twin standing in his bedroom door, leaning against the frame with a carefully careless demeanor. “All right.” He closed the lid of his laptop and stood, digging for his wallet in his bed. “What’re we seeing?”

Al shrugged. “Figured we’d see what’s playin’.”

‘ _Ah_ ,’ Matt thought, finding it under his pillow, _‘so he wants to talk_.’ No one knew the quirks of Al quite like he did, and when Al was being blasé, he had something important he wanted to say.

“Is Liz working?” he asked, letting Al lead the way down the stairs.

“Dunno.” He pushed open the door with his body as he pulled out his phone and keys. “I’ll ask, you tell Mom and Dad where we’re going.”

“Kay.” Matt turned at the door and yelled through the house, “Mom! Dad! Al’n I are gonna see a movie!”

“Make good choices!” their mother yelled back. “Don’t eat too much popcorn, your dad’s making steak!”

“Will do, Mom!” They left and headed to their truck, briefly fighting over the driver. Al won and slid in with a smirk.

“Watch my phone to see if Liz texts back,” he ordered, throwing it in Matt’s lap as he backed out of the driveway. He frowned at the tone, but it beeped before he could protest. He flipped it open and read the message.

“She’s there. Said to let her know when we’re at the door.”

“Sweet. Free movie!”

They sang along badly to the radio with the windows down for the ten minute drive to the only theater in their town, then got waved past the ticket counter by Liz, their close-enough friend and easy free ride to the movies.

Of course they got too much popcorn - one of the large tubs - and a large soda each. There was only a mindless action movie playing at the time, which suited them just fine. They were alone in the theater but an older couple towards the front, so they took the middle of the top row and propped their feet up.

The trailers hadn’t started yet when Al broke into the Skittles bag and said, “So, Arthur and me are dating.”

Matt almost choked on his Sprite. “ _What?_ ”

“Dating. Me and Arthur. Like, going out and kissing and sappy shit like that.” Al was staring hard at his shoes. “Is that okay with you?”

“Well, yeah, it’s fine, but…” He frowned at nothing as he picked out the right words. “You’re not gay.” They were twins, they’d talked about this before. It wasn’t an assumption, it was a fact.

“Not really, no. I dunno, I guess it’s kind of… a mutated mancrush or something.” He shrugged with his whole body and crammed some Skittles in his mouth. “It’s a fluke, I’ll admit, but I still like him and shit, so yeah. Dating.”

“Oh. Well, whatever works.” The lights dimmed and the first trailer started. Matt leaned closer and said low, “You told Mom and Dad yet?”

Al laughed a little. “Well, we only really made it official yesterday, and, well, I wanted to tell you first.” Matt smiled and sat back properly in his seat. This time, Al was the one that leaned over and whispered, “Think they’ll take it well?”

Matt snorted. “Dude, it’s Mom and Dad, I’m sure they’ll just crack a joke and invite him for dinner and you’ll be fine.” Al grinned and sat back, the smile lit from the screen making Matt feel like the best brother in the world for a second.

An afterthought occurred to him, and he leaned over one last time to say, “Just don’t call it a ‘mutated mancrush’ when you tell them.”

Al grinned and nodded, and they went back to the movie.

````      

Matt knew his parents very, very well, as it turned out.

When they got home after the movie, the steaks were ready, and the four of them collected on the couch and loveseat in front of the television, watching a NCIS marathon mindlessly while they ate, using pillows as laptables.

During a commercial break, Al and Matt made eye contact, and Matt gave him a nod.

“Uh, Mom? Dad? I need to tell you something.”

Mr. and Mrs. Jones looked over at their son. Mr. Jones was exactly what the twins would look like in thirty years, handsome, blond, and tall, with vision only a step above legally blind. Mrs. Jones was delicate but terrifying, having been in the Army as a younger woman and retained much of the combat training in her person, passing on pieces of it to her twin boys.

“Yes, Alfred?”

“Uh…” Matt punched his shoulder. “So, you know Arthur, right?”

Mrs. Jones grinned. “Well, of course! He comes over more than any of your other friends, don’t he?” Then the smile faded and she frowned slightly. “Why? Is he in trouble?”

“Oh, nothing like that!” He waved a hand frantically. “See, it’s more like… he’s… kind of… my boyfriend now?” Al laughed nervously and moved his mashed potatoes around on his plate while his parents blinked at him.

“Well it’s about damn time-”

“ _Luke!_ ” Mrs. Jones shouted, hitting him upside the head. He cried out and rubbed his head, grinning sheepishly.

“Come on, Jess, you’re thinking the same thing!” Al and Matt watched their parents fight on the loveseat with raised eyebrows and slightly open mouths. It wasn’t necessarily an unknown sight to them, since their parents were just that type, but it was odd to see them act this way over their son’s sexuality.

Al coughed awkwardly. “Y’all do know this is pretty much a fluke, right?” They stopped their bickering and turned their attention back to their red-faced son. “I mean, I like him and all, but I’m not, like, full gay or anything.”

Mrs. Jones shot her husband one more dirty look before sitting upright and smiling at him. “Oh, sugar cube, that’s not it at all,” she soothed, leaning forward to pat his forearm. “We’ve known you’ve had a thing for Arthur for weeks. We were just waiting for you to tell us yourself.” Matt bit his lip against very inappropriate laughter while Al grinned brightly, oblivious.

“So you’re okay with it?”

“Of course we are!” A blind punch into her husband’s gut.

“Yes, yes, you’ve got a little fairy in ya, whatever, everyone’s got their moments-”

“ _Luke!_ ”

“Don’t look at me like that!”

Mrs. Jones pushed him off the couch and scooted over to pull Al down next to her. “So, you need to tell me everything – when did this happen? How’d you do it? Oh, we need to have him over for dinner soon, so he can _really_ be part of the family!”

Matt and Mr. Jones exchanged a glance while Al squirmed under the attention, then moved to a different room to talk about basketball.


	19. Rolled Tight

It was one of those movie moments that only happen once in a lifetime.

It wasn’t the last game of the season, nor was it their biggest rival; however, it was their last home game before the playoffs, and they didn’t exactly like the other school much, _and_ their coach had a personal grudge against the opposing team’s coach dating back to their own high school days. Arthur was in the school marching band, having been forced to take the clarinet as a child. He had used that as a means to belong to some group in his new American school four years ago. Nowadays, though, he got to sit at the foot of their section on an amp and play the bass guitar, which suited him much better than the girl-dominated woodwinds.

Al, of course, was on the football team. Since they were seniors now, he was the starting quarterback, but he had no problems letting his future successor take the limelight so he could switch to whatever position they needed him at, because he was the most athletically well-rounded of everyone. As long as he got to play, he didn’t mind where he played at.

It was the tail end of the fourth quarter, and they were down by a field goal, third and long and too far away to attempt. The visiting team was already celebrating on the far side of the field, and the home was either holding its breath or cheering loudly, trying to boost the team’s morale as much as they could.

Their coach called a time-out, and the offensive line jogged to the sidelines and huddled around him.

“All right, boys, this is your chance,” he said, pounding his fist into his palm for emphasis. (Coach V was a small man for a football coach, slightly feminine, blond, and a tenth grade trigonometry teacher. However, all of his players had been on the receiving  end of a tackle to the legs, a spiral to the gut, or a blow to their pride enough that they were too respectfully terrified of him to mention it or to care.) “Time to make it or break it. Get this and we’re definitely going to the playoffs for _sure_ , remember that.” He looked at Alfred, the eye contact unintentionally intense. “Al, go down and in on the right this play. Garrett, throw too far, and Al, _book it_. Ivan, try and keep up.” The players called out nodded, and the coach smiled brightly as the referee on the field blew the whistle. “Go and show that asshole of a coach how to _really_ play!” They nodded again, broke, and went back to their positions, Al on the far right and the backup in the center.

“ _Ready! Hike!_ ” The ball snapped and Al took off, fifteen yards, pivot in, look back, _there_ -

He had to jump a little to catch it, but he didn’t stumble on the return and he tucked it under his arm, and even though it was the fourth quarter and he’d been on the field for almost every offensive play, he could still sprint - Ivan, the bitch he was, was five feet behind him, and he hated him but he wouldn’t trust anyone else as his block-

The sound of his lungs deafened him, but a football field’s not that long. There was no way they could catch him now.

He crossed the goal line and caught himself on the goalpost, spun around it to face the field, and he could hear the cheering and the band now under his pounding breath. He grinned a heartbeat before his teammates dogpiled him.

They scored the extra point easily, but he was on the sidelines and barely watched, too busy catching his breath and getting congratulated. He glanced back at the bleachers after he’d downed five cups of Gatorade, found Arthur instantly, sitting on his amp with a giant grin on his face. He was watching him, too, and didn’t look away when they definitely made eye contact. Al beamed a little wider, and the foghorn for the end of the game blared from the scoreboard.

The home stands erupted, the band and the area around it most of all, and Al stood with his team to shake hands and have one last huddle, winking at Arthur before he turned away.

When they jogged off the field to go back to the locker room, people were lining the short alley from the field to behind the bleachers, including Arthur in his typical half-assed band uniform (he didn’t march and he hated the hats, so he wore a green shirt and the pants and no one noticed). When Al saw him squeezing between the last person and the wall, his insatiable smile tried to get wider and he stopped in front of him, gross and sweaty and happier than he’d been in a while.

“So was I awesome or was I awesome?” he asked, leaning on the wall with one hand because he was still slightly out of breath, pretending not to notice how it let him creep a tad into Arthur’s personal space without being too obvious to everyone else that there might be a little more than first glance. They’d come out to the people that mattered, but they didn’t flaunt their relationship on Main Street or anything. They had their self-preservation to think of.

That is, they did until Arthur smirked a little, grabbed the front of his uniform, and pulled him down for a kiss right there in front of the whole crowd.

Al’s eyes flew open, but Arthur kept it short, pulling back after barely more than a peck. The whispers started, but Al’s smile was tugged a little lopsided and Arthur was all but laughing. “You were perfect, love.”

“Glad you think so, honey.” The last of his teammates gave him and Arthur odd glances as they passed by, Coach V taking the rear with the way-too-tall defensive line coach. Coach V looked over at his star player, who had a boy in a band uniform almost pinned against the wall, and chuckled slightly.

“Alfred, gimme five minutes to tell y’all what a good job you did and then you can make out with your boyfriend all you like.” Al, who hadn’t seen his coaches approaching, choked a little in surprise and backed away from Arthur quickly. Coach V laughed harder. “It’s all right, Alfred, I won’t bite you about it. Now, come on.” He patted Alfred on the back and led him towards the locker room, smiling at Arthur behind him. “You just make sure to treat him nice so I don’t lose him so close to the playoffs!”

Arthur blinked a few times and opened his mouth to respond, but they were already out of comfortable earshot.

Then he started to hear the whispers.

He looked to his left at the spectators who hadn’t walked on towards the parking lot and were too interested in why their quarterback was kissing a boy and scowled his worst. “Well, what’re you looking at?” he snapped, stomping through them to start packing up his bass while he waited for Al to finish in the locker room and take him home.


	20. Under Their Skin

“What’s cookin’, good lookin’?”

Arthur shot Alfred, who was leaning on the locker next to his and grinning down at him from his four inches advantage, an unamused raised eyebrow, then went back to trading out textbooks in his locker. “You’re a child, I hope you know that.”

“Yeah, I know, but I’m more fun this way.” Arthur rolled his eyes and closed his locker door, heading to his next class with Alfred tagging along. They both had math third period, but with different teachers, so they got to walk together to the math hallway on this class change every day. “So, how’s your day been?” Al asked after a moment.

“Nothing out of the ordinary.” The hallway traffic congested at a corner, and they used it as an excuse to brush arms. “Yours?”

“Same old, same old. Got a quiz in Coach Ox’s class today, I heard. Gag me.”

Arthur bit his lip, leaned in just a little and murmured, “I’ll save that for tonight, thanks.” Al’s face went red, and Arthur couldn’t hold back his laugh or his flush.

“Yeah, we’ll see about that.” Their paths split, and they paused, smiling at each other a little. “See ya in APES?”

“Definitely.” Arthur told his body to stay put, to not let him step forward and kiss him goodbye; Al rocked on his feet a little, reeled himself in, and turned abruptly, walking quickly to his class. The minute warning bell rang, and Arthur stopped staring at his boyfriend’s backside and hurried on his own way.


	21. Livid Ire, Liquid Fire

Elizaveta was walking into school early, alone, and in the rain, whistling a nonsense tune and spinning her umbrella idly when she heard feet behind her and glanced over her shoulder to see Gilbert without an umbrella. She rolled her eyes a little but stopped so he could catch up as he was trying not to be obvious he was trying to do.

“What’re you doing here this early, Beilschmidt?” she asked, letting him under her umbrella and meeting his pace. He slowed down for her, kicking a broken bit of concrete and hooking his thumbs in his backpack straps. Her umbrella was small, so the motion made their elbows touch with every step.

“It’s not that early, really,” he replied, and his voice sounded _different_ , and she couldn’t tell why. Was it quieter? “You’re just always barely on time that thirty minutes before the bell seems like forever.” He grinned, and she frowned and elbowed him in the side.

“Unless you have something to say, then leave.”

“Go to prom with me.”

She stopped walking; he realized when his hair got tangled in the spokes of the umbrella and backed from it carefully with a soft curse, then looked at her for the first time. She didn’t feel shock, or disgust, or even surprise. Just curiosity.

“Why would you want to go with me? We don’t exactly like each other.”

He sighed heavily, dramatically, and kicked the piece of concrete under a car. “I dunno, Liz. Maybe it’s because you’re aggravating and terrifying and hot and I think we’d have fun together.” Well, _now_ she was shocked. He thought she was hot? He sighed again, but different, and turned away, ducked out from under the umbrella. “Just forget it.”

She scowled at his back and lunged forward to grab his wrist. “No, I won’t! You- you- why would you _say_ that? You don’t really _mean_ that, you can’t really-”

“I’m just as confused as you are, but - I just do, all right?” he yelled a little, throwing her response to his constant question of ‘why do you hate me so much?’ back in her face as he glared at her over his shoulder, genuinely _unhappy_ , and suddenly there were layers to her slight rival she’d never known about.

“Well… all right, then.” It was his turn to stare at her blankly, traces of his glare left on his face.

“Wait, did you just say yes?”

She rolled her eyes with a smile, still holding his wrist. “Yeah, I did.” She pulled him back under her umbrella, and they had to run out of the way of an incoming car and almost got splashed, and she was giggling. “I guess you’re right sometimes,” she admitted. “We’ll have fun together. It’ll at least be interesting.”

He smiled at her, only an inch or two taller, and she hadn’t realized how tense he’d been until he wasn’t. “I know, right? It’s gonna be awesome!” He held open the door as she shook out her umbrella a little and ducked inside the school with a smile in thanks. “And I think Edelstein’s a chaperone.” She made a face to hide her slight blush and pushed him into the wall, running away and laughing as he sputtered and chased after her towards where their friends hung out before class.


	22. Where The Heart Is

“So, how’s it been?”

Arthur looked over at Alfred in the passenger seat of his father’s car in mild surprise. “Al, you’ve been with me for the past-” he checked the clock on his dashboard- “six hours now. You know how it’s been.”

“I don’t mean tonight, I mean this whole… thing.” Al watched the trees and houses go by outside the window. “So… you like dating me, right?”

Arthur blinked at the question. “Well-” He watched the road instead of Al so he could talk easier. “Yes, of course I do.”

Al smiled, and Arthur didn’t see it. “Good, because I-“ He swallowed. “I think I love you, so now’s the time to back out if you want!”

If Arthur hadn’t been stopped at a stop sign, he might have run off the road. That would’ve been bad, since he only got his license a few weeks ago.

“You _what_?”

“I know, I know, it’s only been, like, a month-”

“-Six weeks-”

“- _Whatever_ , and I know I’ve never been in this kinda love before, but- I just _know_ , okay?” He looked at Arthur and waited until he returned the eye contact. “I love you, Arthur.”

Arthur took a deep breath, almost asked him to say it again, but no, that was stupid. Instead, he pulled over on the side of the road and parked the car.

“You really mean it, don’t you?”

“Yeah, I kinda do.”

Arthur laughed a little desperately, head falling onto the steering wheel, and Al’s anxiety grew. “I didn’t scare you away or anything, right? I’m not moving too fast?”

Arthur sat back and smiled at him. “No, Alfred, not at all. I just don’t understand why _me_ , but no, you’re perfect.” He twisted in the driver’s seat and traced a hand down Al’s cheek, staring into such painfully hopeful eyes. “You’re more than perfect. Everyone should be in love with you.”

Al laughed, leaning into the hand. “They don’t matter as long as you do. You _do_ , right?”

“Of course,” he said quietly, looking at his hand instead of the face beneath it. “How could I not?”

Al grinned and leaned forward to kiss him hard, cupping the back of his head with long fingers and yes, yes he very much loved every part of him.

(When they got home, both of their brothers made snide comments about how silly and stupid they looked smiling like that; Arthur threw a magazine at his, while Al completely ignored his and floated to his bedroom.)


	23. I Saw You Coming

Sometimes, there are those people in your life that you always seem to run into in the oddest places. For Alfred, that person was Kiku Honda.

He was an elementary school friend that had transferred to a magnet school before sixth grade, and although they still lived in the same town, they didn’t keep in touch. Even so, every year or so they’d find each other at McDonald’s, the mall, a random concert or the crowd at the Christmas parade, where they’d talk for a few minutes, then go on their own way.

Early in their senior year, right when Al and Arthur were at the height of their relationship, they met again in the horror section of the movie rental store.

It took a minute for Alfred to realize that the lonely, short Asian boy down the aisle was Kiku, but when it did, he beamed and dragged Arthur behind him, calling down the aisle, “Hey, Kiku! That you?”

The other boy looked up from the DVD case at his name and smiled slightly. “Oh, hello, Alfred. Nice to see you.”

Al grinned at him and let go of Arthur’s hand to lift him up in a brief bear hug. “How you been, dude?”

Kiku pushed him away a little, and Al always forgot how big his personal space bubble was. He was still smiling, though, so that was good. “I’ve been well,” he said quietly. He leaned a little to the side to look behind Al and give another polite smile to Arthur. “Hello, Alfred’s friend.”

Arthur raised an eyebrow, but smiled all the same. “It’s Arthur.” He stepped forward around Al so they made a little triangle.

“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Arthur.” Arthur smiled a little more. Whoever this mystery friend of Al’s was, he was achingly polite.

“Yeah, yeah, you two know each other now, now Kiku, what’re you _doing_ here? It’s been ages, and I see you in a movie rental place?” Kiku flashed a short grin, unable to hold it in. Alfred had a tendency to do that.

“I come here a lot, actually. I’m working through the horror genre with some of my friends, and we’ve seen everything we own.” He sighed and looked down at the DVD case in his hand. “It’s hard to find a good, new thriller these days.”

Al laughed. “Sounds like fun, man. So, think you can give us a rec? We keep fighting over which _Lord of the Rings_ is the best-”

“- _I told you_ , _Return of the King_ is the strongest film of all three-”

“-And I’m telling _you_ that _The Two Towers_ is way cooler as long as you cut out anything with Sam and Gollum together in the scene-”

Kiku’s soft laugh cut off the arguing before it could begin. “If it means solving an argument, I’d be glad to help.” Arthur huffed and crossed his arms as Kiku turned to the shelves, quickly picking out three and handing them to Alfred. “These are just a few classics, but I don’t know what you’ve seen, so take your pick.”

Arthur snorted. “You obviously haven’t seen Al squeal like a girl from a neighborhood haunted house enough. He avoids these movies like the plague.” Al wrinkled his nose at him, and Arthur smirked.

“I do vaguely remember Halloween of fourth grade-”

Al cut him off with an obnoxious laugh; Arthur and Kiku exchanged an amused glance, and Kiku started to explain the movies he’d picked out.

Eventually, they left the store with _The Shining_ and a new conversation partner, who followed Al back to his house and joined them in their movie watching. Arthur breathed a little easier when Kiku only smiled at Al’s arm sneaking around his shoulders, and just like that, he made a new friend.


	24. Your Love Exposed

Halfway through the Joneses’ Labor Day cookout, Alfred and Arthur were nowhere to be seen. Mr. and Mrs. Jones, who had been delighted to see Arthur again after all these years, were initially worried and wanted to go look for them, but Matthew and Francis jumped out of their Franglish conversation and stopped them so viciously that they didn’t have to ask why.

Upstairs in Alfred’s old room, Arthur was in Alfred’s lap, shirt off his shoulders and hands buried in Al’s hair, who in turn was latched onto the side of his neck, remembering an old favorite taste.

“We shouldn’t- the party-” Arthur tried to protest, breathing hard and loving it. Alfred grinned against his Adam’s apple.

“Don’t worry about them, honey.” Arthur stiffened, and – oh shit, was it too soon for that? He’d always called him honey in high school and none of his later relationships have been given that particular pet name, but that was high school, and this very much wasn’t.

Even if Arthur felt the same but different against him.

Then Arthur sighed, melting, deflating. “It’s been a while since y- someone called me that.” He pulled Al’s head up so he could kiss his mouth, open and languid. Alfred slipped his eyes closed and tasted the ketchup. “I missed it,” Arthur whispered into his mouth.

Alfred laughed, falling back on his bed so Arthur was stretched out over him. He grinned up at him and kissed the corner of his mouth.

“I missed _you_ ,” he said, biting his lip after because God, that was _definitely_ too much on the first day back.

Arthur just blinked and laughed, a real laugh, and it made Alfred’s heart soar just like he remembered. “You haven’t changed a bit, have you?” he asked, running his hands down Alfred’s cheeks to his neck. The tone was a little awful, a little wonderful, a little wistful.

“Nah, of course I’ve changed,” Al shrugged, letting his own hands glide up under Arthur’s shirt and brush along his back. “But only for the better, I think.”

Arthur smiled softly at him, bent forward to kiss him just as softly. “I think I’m all right with that.”


	25. I Remember Being Young

Arthur, Alfred had decided, had missed out on way too much by not going to elementary school in the States.

It was the tail end of their last summer of high school, and they were driving around idly after dark, Alfred sharing old stories of his childhood spent in their small town while Arthur listened with a smile. Every now and then he’d offer a glimpse of what life had been for him in England, but mostly he was content to lean into his boyfriend’s side and listen to embarrassing fourth grade stories of their current friends.

Unavoidably, Alfred’s aimless driving took them to the elementary school itself. He parked by the playground and dragged Arthur out of the cab, keeping his hand in a firm grip. Arthur let himself smile behind his back.

“It’s been a long time since I came over here,” Alfred said, jumping a foot up to walk along the old wooden balance beam. “It got smaller.”

“Places like this always seem to, don’t they?”

Alfred snorted. “Yeah. I miss the old days.”

Arthur couldn’t help but laugh. “So I gathered.”

Alfred stepped off the end of the beam and turned, pulled Arthur against his chest for a sudden kiss. Arthur hummed into it and slid his free hand around to hold him close. When Alfred pulled away, he grinned down at him mischievously. “These days aren’t so bad, either.”

Arthur rolled his eyes and stepped back into his own personal space bubble again, although he let Alfred keep hold of his hand. “You’re impossible.”

“Pretty much.” Alfred looked around, losing himself in his own memories for a moment, then let out a small cry and led them over to the brand new swingset. “No way, they’ve got _swings_ now? We asked them for this for _years_!” He let go of Arthur’s hand at last to sit down in one of the three swings there, bouncing a little to test it. Arthur stood in front of him, hand on his hip and struggling to hold back a grin.

“I guess they just didn’t love your class enough.” Alfred pouted at him, and Arthur chewed on his bottom lip. Al pushed himself a little so he could poke Arthur’s leg with his foot.

“Now you’re just being mean.”

Arthur chuckled and stepped forward enough to grab the plastic-covered chains and hold Alfred still, bent down and kissed him briefly. “Only to you, love.” Alfred smiled loopily at him and grabbed his waist, pulling him to stand between his legs. Arthur went a step further and sat in his lap, holding himself up by the chains for a moment so he could twist his legs around behind Al’s back without making them fall over. Al held him steady and laughed, keeping up the momentum Arthur’s jump had made and swinging them slightly, toes dragging slightly in the grooves worn in the dirt by small children at recess.

Alfred smiled up at Arthur, who was smirking a little with his hair in his eyes. “Damn, you’re hot,” Al breathed, leaning forward to kiss his neck. Arthur laughed breathlessly, sucking back a sigh at the touch and blushing slightly at the comment.

“You’ve told me that a few times, I believe.” Arthur started to lean back a little with each swing forward, legs tightening around Alfred to keep him on the swing when he had both arms around Arthur’s waist.

“Well it’s true!” Arthur rolled his eyes a little and kissed Al’s forehead, the closest thing to mouth level. Al’s arms pulled him a little closer, their stomachs completely pressed together by now. Arthur’s eyes narrowed at nothing over the top of Al’s head.

“If you try and have sex with me on your primary school playground I _will_ think less of you, though.” Al snorted, breath hitting Arthur’s neck.

“Wasn’t even thinking about it, perv.” He dragged his feet on the ground to stop their slight swinging. “Although, now that you mention it…”

“ _No_ , Alfred.” Al laughed and stood, not letting go of Arthur, who did let go of the swing chains after a moment and latched on Al’s neck instead.

“Whatever you say, honey.” He buried his face in Arthur’s neck, nuzzling into his skin. “But I _do_ happen to know a good church parking lot we can try and desecrate if you’d like,” he whispered into his ear, pulling at his earlobe with his teeth. Arthur laughed and unlocked his ankles. Alfred took the hint and let him down to his feet gently.

“As long as you didn’t go to preschool there, it sounds lovely.” He took Alfred’s hands from around his waist and held both of them, pulling him back towards the truck. Alfred followed with a goofy grin.


	26. Let's Live It, Girl

“Hey, Al. What’s up?”

“ _Hey, you home?_ ”

“Uh. Yeah?”

“ _Because we’re outside if you want to hang out._ ”

Liz looked down at herself, curled in bed in her pajamas already and laptop in front of her. “Who’s with you?”

“ _Me ‘n’ Matt, Art, Francis ‘n’ Gil. Are you already in your PJs?_ ”

Liz rolled away from her laptop to stand properly. “Maybe, but I can be ready in a sec. Where’re y’all going?”

“ _Dunno. But seriously, come with us._ ”

“Kay. I’ll be out in a bit.”

“ _Awesoooome_.” He hung up, and Liz started shoving aside clothes to look for a bra.

When she was ready and told her mom what little she knew of their plans, she grabbed her phone and ran outside, where Al and Matt’s old truck was idling. The twins and Arthur were in the cab, and Francis and Gil were in the bed. They cheered when she appeared, and Matt turned the engine back on as she waved at the boys in the cab before climbing in the back, using the wheel as a stepping block.

“Sup, bitches,” she said, dropping down between the two. They laid down in the bed as Matt took off, tires screeching a little, and they clutched each other’s forearms and laughed until Matt regained his sanity and stopped lurching between gears.

“So what’re we doing?” she yelled over the wind.

“Dunno,” Gil yelled back, and she winced as he yelled directly in her ear. “I think Matt said something about doughnuts.”

“I’m cool with that.” Matt hit a curb on purpose, and they all lurched into each other. Liz sat up and banged on the window, trying to yell through the glass. Arthur in the middle turned and smirked at her and pointed at his ear, mouthing “ _We can’t hear you!_ ” She stuck her tongue out at him, and he gave her his weird British bird.

“Bastards,” she mumbled as she laid back down. The two boys laughed, and they started trading insults about the three in the cab.

They did end up buying a mixed dozen of doughnuts from the 24/7 Krispy Kreme and driving to a nearby pond with a small pier built over it. They sat on the edge and swung their feet over the dark water, taunting the ducks swimming a few yards away. Al was the first to lay back and watch the stars, but one by one, they all joined him, falling into pleasant silence only disrupted by the occasional comment.

Liz, who was only wearing the tank top she had tried to go to sleep in, was the first to crack. “I’m cold.”

“Yeah, lezgit outta here.” They stood and left the box for the ducks to fight over. They all pretended not to notice how it took Arthur’s hand an awkwardly long time to let Al’s go after helping him up.

This time, though, Al won the rights to the wheel, and Matt and Liz traded places, since she was The Girl and tired of the wind. Like always, Alfred sang along badly to the radio while Arthur critiqued him, and Liz laughed at the both of them while keeping one eye on the dashboard clock. She liked them all, of course, Gil excluded, but she was counting down the minutes until she could be asked to be taken home. She’d been in the middle of reading a fabulous fi and wanted to finish before she went to sleep. (Not that she’d tell them that, of course. She had her dignity to think about.)

12:36 ticked by, and she yawned and leaned on Arthur’s shoulder. “I’m tired. Can I go home?”

Al groaned. “Already?”

“Unlike _some_ people I could mention, I _worked_ today.”

“Oh, boo hoo. But okay, sure.” She smiled and made herself comfortable on Arthur, getting a secret laugh out of how stiff he was under her.

She sat up and let him relax before too long, though, and they had a pointless conversation she didn’t remember when they finally pulled up to her house again.

“Thanks for draggin’ me along, boys,” she said, sliding out of the cab and patting her back pocket to make sure she had her phone.

“Any time, Liz.”

“Aw, is the witch leaving?” Gil called from the bed as she walked around the front of the cab. She picked up a pinecone from her front lawn and threw it at him, hitting him in the shoulder. “Hey, fuck, that hurt!”

“You’re just such an easy target at night!”

“Oh, _burn_.”

“Matt, shut up!”

“I dunno care anymore if it’s Kirklan’ up theah, I ain’ listenin’ ta this shit all nigh’,” Francis grumbled, jumping out of the bed to take Liz’s old spot. She giggled and waved goodbye again, then ran inside to the Internet as they drove away.

Time to finish that fic.


	27. Slow Wind

**Slow Wind**

Arthur was saying something, presenting to the class about the pros and cons of forest fires out West, but Al wasn’t listening a lick. He was just watching Arthur, using the chance to stare without shame at the way his mouth moved, the downcast eyes that occasionally lifted from his notes to glance at the class, the freckles on his temple, the skin of his forearms under pushed-up sleeves. Arthur was oblivious to his in-depth checking out, flipping to the next slide on the slideshow and letting his group member have her turn. Al shifted his attention, but barely, still sneaking heavy glances at him periodically. Arthur sighed quietly and ran his hand through his hair as she stumbled through her slide, and Al’s heart flipped.

He was in so, _so_ deep, and he had no defense against the fall.

When their presentation was done, Arthur came back and sat in his seat next to Al – since it was a science class, the room had two person lab tables instead of single serving desks, and Kirkland was right before Jones in this alphabetical order. Al beamed at him, Arthur smiled in return, and his heart flipped again.

“Good job,” he said.

“Thanks. Thought Erica was gonna kill us for a bit there, but it all worked out.”

Al prodded him with his elbow. “Nah, y’all killed it. You – wait for it – _burned down the house_.”

Arthur snorted and held in his louder laugh as the next group started their presentation about El Niño. “That was terrible.”

“You know it.” They smiled at each other, then Arthur turned his attention to the storms and diagram of the submerged coastline on the screen, and Al took a few subtle deep breaths.

He needed to do something about this crush. It was annoying not to be able to think straight when Arthur was around, and yet want to spend all of his time in his presence. It’d only been a few weeks since this just sprung up out of nowhere, but once it showed its head, it never wanted to go back into hiding. He’d have to try plan B, then.

Time to start pulling on Arthur’s metaphorical pigtails.


	28. In Every Way

Alfred and Arthur were driving nowhere special, they don’t even remember, listening to the radio with the windows down on the highway. It was on the local hits station, and they were yelling along or yelling over it in turn, depending on the song. Currently it was in the over stage as a sweet acoustic song crooned through the wind. A lull in the conversation, and Alfred listened to the lyrics of the song for a moment.

_Lucky I’m in love with my best friend_   
_Lucky to have been where I have been_   
_Lucky to be comin’ home again_   
_Lucky we’re in love in every way_

His eyes went wide and he slapped his hand on the steering wheel. “Fuck!”

“What?”

“Goddamn it, Arthur! Listen to the song!” Arthur cocked his head and held in a laugh but obliged.

_They don’t know how long it takes_   
_Waiting for a love like this_   
_Every time we say goodbye_   
_I wish we had one more kiss_

Arthur shrugged. “What about it?”

“Fuck, man, it’s _us!_ ”

Arthur pulled a frown of disbelief, but as he thought about it and listened, it turned into wide-eyed horror.

_Lucky we’re in love in every way_   
_Lucky to have stayed where we have stayed_   
_Lucky to be coming home someday_

“Shit!”

“I know, right? Just…” Alfred shook the steering wheel as much as he dared when driving on the highway and growled. “How did we let that _happen_?”

“God, I don’t know!”

_You hear the music fill the air_   
_I put a flower in your hair_

They both groaned with all their force, and Arthur finally changed the channel to one of the five country stations in radio wave reach.

“We will never speak of this again.”

“Agreed.”

They drove on to wherever their forgotten destination was, frustrated for a moment that they had let their relationship turn sappy enough to be perfectly described by a bad love duet, but when the spark of irritation died, they laughed at themselves and the silly song.

After all, it was just a song, and they both knew they were more than that.


	29. With Sweat And Skin

The best part about parties at Antonio’s house, Alfred and Arthur learned, was the lack of judgment.

Anywhere else in their small Louisiana community, they were liable to get anything from dirty looks to dirty insults thrown their way for acting on their relationship even the tiniest amount in public. At Antonio’s, though, the host was not only openly gay but impossible to dislike, and there was enough alcohol and happiness involved at all times that no one cared about the identities of the people making out on the grass outside the open patio doors, much less their genders.

But, despite all of this knowledge, that didn’t mean they didn’t worry.

It was late March, so it was just a little chilly after long exposure outside, but Arthur never planned to let Alfred and his body heat far enough to let that happen, stretched out over his boyfriend’s prone form and teasing his kisses out, soft presses that matched the slow rolls of his hips. Alfred’s hands roamed over his back, shirt halfway up his torso, pushing up into the kiss and dragging him down. The grass was wet under his forearms, propped up on either side of Al’s head and anchoring his head with fingers in his hair. Al’s clothes had to be soaked, but Arthur couldn’t bring himself to care.

The chatter and shatter of the party inside was their soundtrack, hidden in the shadows of moonlight and the Carriedo’s back lawn, rhythm and white noise and not hard, not loud. Al pried open Arthur’s mouth with his so he could trace his tongue around his teeth, bucking up, wanting more than Arthur’s slow pace whenever he ended up on top. Arthur smiled against his mouth, turning his head more to give Al the most access to his molars. Al’s knee bent up slowly between Arthur’s, and Arthur slid up a few inches with it, fingers sliding around to cup the back of Al’s head.  

Something shattered inside, and Arthur gasped away, eyes flicking nervously towards the light of the door and back to Alfred’s flushed face. Al smiled and rubbed circles into the skin of his back with his thumbs.

“Don’ worry ‘bout them, honey,” he whispered, craning up to kiss his cheek, jaw, throat. Arthur squirmed.

“But what if-” Al’s tongue cut him off, ferocious and pent-up. His nails dug into Arthur’s back, trying to tear that argument out of Arthur’s skin. When they broke away slowly, Arthur didn’t ask again, but it was _there_ , waiting.

Alfred rolled them over in the grass, crouching over Arthur and taking them away from Arthur’s slow, teasing pace, trying to kiss away their doubts, trying to burn out the lingering gray, trying to scare away their fears, _trying._

Try, try again.


	30. Paper Trails

Arthur flicked his fringe out of his eyes for the fifth time in ten minutes, blowing at it angrily as he sat on Alfred’s bed, where the two of them were doing their maths review sheet for their test tomorrow between Mario Kart rounds. Matt wasn’t in their maths class and didn’t have homework that night, choosing instead to mock them through the wall between his and Al’s room while they cursed at derivatives and limits and he goofed off on the Internet.

Al smiled at him as Arthur frowned at his fringe, cross-eyed, tugging on it in exasperation. “Need a haircut, Art?”

“I _shouldn’t_ need one already, I just _got_ a trim last month!” He groaned and fell on his back, head hanging upside down off the edge of the bed. “My hair grows too bloody fast.”

“Art, I want you and your vocab to never, ever change, okay? I love knowing someone who actually says ‘bloody’ as much as you do.”

“Yeah, well, your mum.”

“Oh! And mum! That too!” Arthur kicked at him blindly, then groaned again and pushed himself up as Al laughed and grinned at him. Arthur’s hair flopped forward as his center of gravity changed, obscuring half his vision once more. Arthur growled and ran his hands back through his hair, trying to pin it back with sheer force of will. Alfred laughed at him and dug around in his sheets for the discarded paper clips from their review packets. “Hang on, I got this!”

Arthur frowned at him before he realised Alfred’s objective and tried to scramble away, but Al was too fast for him. He tackled Arthur’s torso and held him down by straddling his knees, laughing breathlessly as he fought Arthur’s thrashings, trying to pin back his hair with one of the paper clips and missing, poking Arthur in the forehead. “Come on, stop moving, I’m trying to help you!”

“Like fuck you are! Get off me!”

“Nope!” Al finally won enough to poorly pin his hair back, brushing back the strands left out of the paper clip barrette from his forehead softly, tenderly, shocking Arthur enough that he stopped struggling and stared up at Alfred, breathing slightly hard and completely lost in the attention. Al was looking at his hand, which was still carefully petting his hair, even though all of the stray hairs were out of Arthur’s eyes. A blink, and their eyes locked, and Alfred had _never_ been this close to Arthur’s face. Sometimes, familiarity made him forget that he was actually devastatingly attractive.

Not that he was attracted to him or anything.

… _Shit_.

Before the moment could turn even more quiet and _affectionate_ , Matt’s voice called through the wall, “ _Hey! If you two are gonna have sex, let me know so I can get the hell out of here!_ ”

They both choked on their flushing embarrassment, and Al clambered off of Arthur’s legs as Arthur kicked him away, straightening up and yanking out the paper clip from his hair viciously enough to tear out a few hairs by the root, curling his knees to his chest, staring unseeing down at his review sheet as Al yelled something happy and insulting back at his twin.

“So.” He looked up at Al, who was red in the face and staring holes into his bedspread. “The chain rule?”

“Oh. Right.” Arthur swallowed and dug around for his pencil, and they picked back up where they left off, talking much quieter and making much less eye contact than before.

When Arthur went home not much later (read: ran out once the last problem was done), he curled up on his own bed with his pillow hugged to his chest, staring in blank horror at the wall through his damned fringe.

_Shit._


	31. Bedrooms

**Alfred’s Bedroom**

The walls are bare and blue, the ceiling white, covered in stick-on stars and planets. A bed with a denim duvet takes up the majority of the floor space, unmade and littered with candy wrappers, video game cases, unopened textbooks. The door is always open. A large window without blinds or curtains stands open across the room from the door, muggy air stagnant around it. There is a cheap, old TV set on a small bookshelf at the foot of the bed, tangles of gaming consoles and cords impossibly tied around it. The shelf itself has a few DVDs, a few more games, a few old school required reading books and a few rare, much loved actual books. On the far side of the TV from the door, the door to a small closet hangs open, sparse with a few Sunday-best outfits, a Superman Halloween costume, a carefully-tended letterman’s jacket.

Half of the drawers of the dresser are hanging open, spitting out their darks, whites, and blues across the cream carpet. The top of the dresser is covered in an eclectic odds and ends collection - small trophies, old homeworks and tests, dust, Post-It notes, clothes, a cracked agate holding down a star map. An old lamp with faded roses painted on the shade has been shoved to the back corner of the dresser, dangerously close to falling. (A few cracks suggests a history of this.) The only pictures are the stick figures doodled on a few of the homeworks and an old Polaroid of two blond-haired twin boys, toddlers, playing under a tree.

By the head of the bed (it has navy sheets with white polka dots) is a heavy nightstand, a better lamp keeping watch over a rotting banana peel, an expensive alarm clock, some used plates and cups, a stick of deodorant, a plastic retainer case, a collection of writing utensils. That drawer is closed.

Under the bed is a suitcase filled with winter clothes, old board games, a dead computer, a few old, empty beer bottles. A lost sock. A green shirt much smaller than the clothes around it.

There is a duffel bag reeking of sweat by the door, zipper half open to show a practice jersey with a number 50 airbrushed on, bunched-up socks, a pair of football cleats. More discarded practice gear and the damp towels that accompany sports are shoved into the corners of the room, to be thought about later. Next to the duffel is a backpack, Patagonia and bright blue, papers bursting the seams, books and notebooks carelessly thrown in. A keychain of a shamrock hangs from one of the zipper pulls next to another star and a small stuffed whale. A pair of kicked-off sneakers is nearby, laces still tied and soles slightly muddy and grassy.

The lights are out, but the stars are still glowing, helping those out the window make the night a little brighter.

* * *

**Arthur’s Bedroom**

The door doesn’t have a working handle, actually - the bolt is painted shit - but it’s always barred by the closet door on the other side, propped open, when the room is occupied. Inside is beige and cream paint over hardwood, covered by an old green rug that needs washing and clothes that need it more. Shoes are carelessly thrown everywhere, only half of them the same size, only outnumbered by the books towered on every surface. They range from every condition, size, age, and genre, tilting precariously under their own weight. Some are missing dust jackets, while others the bindings themselves, held together only with their original glue, tape, and prayers. There is no overhead lighting in the room, instead relying on its two corner room windows and a collection of floor lamps lining the perimeter of the room.

The bed is a twin, piled with bunched-up blankets of any color and one pillow, pencil shavings, small books, and peppermint drop wrappers lost in their folds. One of the windows is behind the head board, shutters kept closed by the bed frame, but the white wooden blinds are cracked open anyway. There is the odd old band poster on the wall, taped up and forgotten, and a small Union Jack drawn by the door frame in red pen and blue marker at about the height of a thirteen year old’s eyes. In the corner of the room that is shaded from the windows is a small amp propping up a red bass guitar, the strap patterned with pirate skulls, and a stereo. Cassettes and CDs are stacked as precariously as the books around it, even a few record sleeves - for the sentimental value. The guitar is plugged in, but the entire system is turned off.

On the other side of the bed-nest from the guitar is the dresser, crossing as a night table because of space. The drawers are mostly closed, but the floor in front of it is impossible to see under the dark-washed jeans, ratty jackets, and assorted T-shirts dropped there. A mirror is propped against the wall on top of it, edges fringed with old stickers, held in place by a lamp and a beer bottle holding some wilted wildflowers in dirty water. Mugs with a half inch of cold tea leave rings in the wood. An analog alarm clock is lying on its side by the edge near the bed, next to a stagnant water glass and a bottle of aspirin. Papers are pinned down by the tea mugs, torn notebook paper and homework worksheets and sheet music. An untouched bottle of cologne is collecting dust and rubber bands beside an old family picture in front of an unfamiliar house and a small box of British coins.

Under the bed is shoved memorabilia - an extra pillow, a few hidden stuffed animals, a tacky umbrella, a plastic storage bin of journal and photo albums - mostly journals. The current one is under the alarm clock. Hidden in the pages of the old ones are assorted sex items - condoms, porn magazines, lubricant.

The closet has the few jackets not on the floor, some nice pants and sweaters, two halves of a green marching band uniform. There are more empty hangers than clothes. The rest of that wall is taken up by a bookshelf absolutely stuffed with books.


	32. Crazy Over You

Alfred only ever went to Arthur’s house when his family wasn’t around. Oh, the Kirklands liked him well enough, but Arthur didn’t get along with _any_ of them, and he would generally hide in his room or leave the house when they were around, anyway. And if Al came to hole up with him _now_ , he’d never hear the end of it at the breakfast table.

Through lucky coincidence, though, both of his parents were out that evening, along with the brothers that were still living at home, so Arthur took his relatively new boyfriend home and straight up to his room.

“I’ll never understand why you need so many blankets,” Al quipped as they pulled enough of them off the bed to be able to lie down.

“It gets cold in this bloody room at night,” Arthur grumbled. Al shrugged, and Arthur rolled his eyes from the other side of the bed, leaning over it to grab his collar and drag him in for the first kiss, putting one knee on top of the bed for a less painful angle. Al smiled and held his waist lightly, keeping him steady as Arthur crawled fully onto the mattress and knelt in front of him, holding Alfred’s face as he kissed him.

He pulled Alfred down over him, falling back on his bed without finesse. Alfred let out an ‘ _oof_ ’ into his mouth and grinned, backing just enough away to speak. “You’re a little impatient today.”

Arthur rolled his eyes as Al climbed on the bed with him and straddled him, deigning not to respond and instead kiss him again, properly now that his pleasant weight and heat was crowding him in. The blankets left on the bed cushioned him better than some of the hard surfaces they’d made out on in the two months of their relationship, and he melted back to urge Alfred in deeper, dovetailing his mouth sideways to let Alfred’s tongue in.

They hadn’t memorized each other yet, hadn’t picked out each other’s pores quite enough. Alfred’s hands tickled him too much, and Arthur bit, but they were learning, always. And when Arthur opened his mouth as wide as it was comfortable against Alfred’s, he took the initiative and forced his tongue in, swirling it deep and tracing Arthur’s palate ridges. He sighed, keeping Al’s head down with one hand as he pulled his shirt out of his jeans with the other, running a hand over smooth skin. Alfred shivered and drew back to a normal kiss - too long like that was uncomfortable. He stroked his fingers down Arthur’s face lightly, down his neck and skipping over his shirt to grab his waist and bend him up, they’re both half-hard. Arthur wrapped a leg over his thighs and rutted up unconsciously, barely realizing what he was doing but it made Alfred’s mind stutter and one of his hands snake between them to tug at their flies.

He let it be when they were both unbuttoned, returning the grind and stumbling over Arthur’s soft pulse as they tried to reorganize to each other. The motion brought their pants down with each hip roll, only peeking underwear and zipper teeth separating their cocks. They kept it that way for now, too busy kissing each other to care about going further.

Arthur still wasn’t quite used to this, being wrapped up in someone all the time pleasantly. In Arthur’s years in America, he’d had his fair share of interested girls, been introduced to the world of soft sighs and long hair, but they never lasted long, went very deep. He’d never been one to stand the same person for too long without needing his space - even Alfred, for the three years he’d known him before all of _this_ happened, had made him want to run to his room and close off from the world. But something had clicked recently and he couldn’t get enough of this boy anymore, soaking him up like sunshine on a winter day, like rain to a rose. He was addicted to the timbre of his voice, his hair on his cheek, his mismatched socks and quicksilver grin. He made his muscles weak and thoughts swim, and he’d never be in love like this again.

And it scared the shit out of him.

Al pulled away at some point to kiss at his neck, up and down and over, trying to find the spots that made him curse and shiver. He slid just a little to the side, just enough to wiggle his hand down Arthur’s briefs and ghost his fingers over Arthur’s cock. “ _Ah hell_.” Alfred laughed against his neck, nudging aside his shirt collar to mouth at more skin. His hand was dry, but _oh_ , just what he needed. Arthur bucked into it, reaching around to hold up Alfred’s head and crane sideways to kiss him with a wide open mouth and lots of air, eyes fluttering indecisively. Where Arthur had the experience, Alfred had the creativity, the ambition, the daring. He squeezed.

Arthur felt his shudders turn into heavy twitches, and reached down to catch Alfred’s wrist. “Something wrong?” Al asked, breathed. He shook his head, but couldn’t quite get out the words.

“Jus’... stop for a tic.” Alfred nodded, nuzzling into his cheek as they regained their breath. They were both hard, they were both willing, but they were both afraid.

After a few minutes of lying there, Alfred’s hand down his pants and eyes closed, they just gave up, curling into each other and pulling the ends of the blankets around themselves. Breathing evened, and they dozed.

Later, Arthur’s family arriving home in loud intervals would wake him up with a start, and he’d have to shake Alfred awake and try to sneak him down the stairs without them noticing. A groggy Alfred moved slow and heavy, though, and they found him kissing Arthur goodbye at the door.

The next three days were hell at the breakfast table for Arthur, but it was worth it to have his bed smell like Alfred for longer.


	33. Fold Me

It was an early school morning, fog damp and cold in the air, and neither Jones brother was very awake when they waved to their mother and stumbled to their truck. They did manage to have a half-hearted fight for the driver’s seat, but Matt won without much contest. When they were sitting and shivering the cab, waiting on the heater to turn on and defrost the dew from the windshield, they looked over at each other and recognized what the other was wearing for the first time.

“God _damn_ , we did it again,” Al groaned, dragging his hand through his hair and pulling at the zipper of his letterman’s jacket. Matt huffed and hunched up his shoulder to hide behind the collar of his matching one. “You take it off.”

Matt glared at his twin. “Fuck you, I did it last time, and I was cold all day!”

“Well go get a different jacket then!”

“No, we don’t have time for that, we’re late already!”

They glared at each other some more, the fight turning into a silent staring contest, before Matt sighed and shucked it off, throwing it into the leg room in front of Al. “Fine, but I get to drive for the rest of the week.”

“Whatever, I just don’t want the stupid twin jokes all day like last time.” They shuddered at the memory, and Matt put the truck in reverse to back out of their driveway.


	34. Woman You've Become

The crowning moment of Gilbert's high school life was the time he got put on the ballot for Homecoming Queen.

It wasn't _really_ him, of course. Their school had a fairly small population for the area at around 800 students, so it was easy to get his friends to nominate 'Gilberta Beilschmidt' instead of the tenish shoe-ins for the title in the actual female population. He tried this trick every year, but someone in the SGA always caught it and cast him out before it got to the voting stage, which most people admitted was a crying shame.

Most people would also pay almost anything to see Gilbert wear a dress and stand in the football field during halftime of their homecoming game, just for the pictures.

His senior year, though, salvation finally arrived in the form of a grumpy gay limey.

" _Pleaaaase_ , Arthur, just let Gilberta be on the ballot!" he begged, throwing himself over his desk dramatically while they had free time in Government. Arthur scowled at him and poked him in the forehead with his pencil.

"And why would I do that? It's a stupid prank, and I'm glad you're graduating this year so it won't happen again."

Gil stuck his tongue out at him. "Nah, I'm sure some idiot'll try it next year, too." Arthur made a face and went back to bullshitting an essay for Environmental. "But _pleeeeaaaaase_ , Arthur! Just let me get this one thing, and I'll never bother you again! You're SGA _president_ , that's gotta mean something!"

"It means absolute bollocks and you know it."

Gil sighed and sat up, hiding the sudden evil glint in his eye by digging through his backpack for his phone. "You know, I didn't want to have to bring this up, but…" He scrolled through the pictures on his phone, looking for one in specific and, when he was sure the teacher wasn't looking, brandished it in Arthur's face.

He looked up from his essay in blank disinterest at first, but then his mind registered the picture and his eyes widened in horror.

" _Where did you get that_."

"Matt sent it to me. You know, y'all should be a lot nicer to him sometimes." Arthur grabbed for the phone, but Gil snatched it away. "Nah-ah, not until you agree to put me on the ballot."

"This is blackmail and evil."

"Tell me something I don't know. Do we have a deal?"

Arthur glared at him fiercely for a few moments, but eventually he sighed and gave up. "Fine, whatever, just delete that picture."

"Whatever you say, Mr. President."

"Oh, do shut up."

Gil ended up losing to Katya, but it was a fun election race and by far the most entertaining part of that year's homecoming. When his SGA officer friends asked Arthur about this sudden change of heart, though, he could only blush and cough before changing the subject, which was almost as precious to Gil as his fifteen minutes of small town fame.


	35. Winter Wear

“Come on, just once, for me! Please?”

“For _the last time_ , I’m not going to wear your bloody school jacket like some silly girl!”

Al sighed and slumped over Arthur’s back, resting his chin on his shoulder and whining into his ear. “You don’t have to be a silly girl to wear your boyfriend’s jacket!” He wrapped his arms around Arthur’s waist, and he slapped at his hands but didn’t try to push him away, even though he didn’t look up from his AP Government textbook. Al took that as a sign that he could resettle himself from his uncomfortable sprawl to the side from his calculus and curl up better behind Arthur, nuzzling into his neck. “I bet you’d be cute wearing it.”

“That is neither here nor there, and I’m never cute,” Arthur snapped, reading the same paragraph for the third time. “It’d be too damned big on me, anyway.”

Al grinned. “Exactly!”

“Alfred.”

“Hmm?”

“No.”

Al pouted. “You’re no fun.”

Arthur turned his head to make some eye contact, pressing his cheek against Al’s temple in the process. “And yet you date me anyway.”

“Mmm.” He turned his head to trail his mouth over Arthur’s jawline. “It’s totally for the accent.” Arthur snorted, and Al grinned, nipping his skin before sliding away and back to integrals.

They went back to their homework in silence for a few minutes, leaning back into each other’s shoulders and taking in the quiet of an empty house.

Al rested his head back on top of Arthur’s. “But you _would_ look really cute weari-”

“Al. Drop it.”


	36. Taste Will Always Change

Lunch periods were scheduled during fifth period – a ninety minute block instead of forty five – and divided into three sections and rotated so only a third of the student body was occupying the cafeteria at any one time. The three periods were called A, B, and C lunch, and oftentimes, the lunch period you had that year determined who your closer friends were.

In their senior year, though, and when the weather was nice, students got the chance to sit on the ‘senior patio’, which was really a few picnic tables thrown under some trees by the door closest to the cafeteria, but it was sweet, sweet fresh air and a coveted privilege by all.

There were other perks, too.

“Mmm, I love triple threat days,” Bridget purred during B lunch, looking slyly out of the corner of her eye at the practice field that the senior patio’s grass bled into. All sports classes that had fifth periods were scheduled during C lunch to allow maximum practice time, so the other two lunches got to watch the players practice with varying levels of interest. Today, football, baseball, and soccer were sharing field time.

“You can say that again,” Maddie said from her seat next to Bridget, paired up on one of the four benches on their table. “Oh, I think soccer’s doing shirts versus skins. God, I hope Toni gets the short stick.”

“Why do I sit with y’all,” Matthew moaned, swirling his gravy into his pashed potatoes. The table filled with girls laughed.

“Oh, poor Matthew.” Mei patted his arm with a too-gleeful smile. “Anyway, how did y’all think you did on the AP Gov test?”

The change of topic was quickly accepted as all the girls started groaning and complaining, and Matt knocked knees with Mei under the table and smiled in thanks. She blushed and looked away, joining into Katyusha and Lili’s talk about the short answers.

“Oh, mmm, I really like Ivan’s muscle shirt today,” Wy hummed out of nowhere, using her superior angle to the practice field for optimal snooping.

Her benchmate Victoria sighed. “I just wish football and Al wasn’t so far away, I _really_ like those pants.”

“ _Guys! We talked about the twin-brother thing!”_

“The two girls giggled. “Don’t worry, Matt, you’re cute, too.” He hid his face in his hands to cover his blush as the girls cackled.

“I hate everyone at this table,” he muttered into his palms.

“Oh, poor Matthew!”

* * *

In C lunch, the case was exactly the opposite. All of the fifth period sports classes were out, which was mostly baseball, football, soccer, and basketball, and those poor leftover classes that weren’t athletic just hoped they got to the cafeteria line before the players got out of the shower.

On the senior patio, the previously girl-dominated table held too-loud laughter and growing shoulders, but for one.

“Liz, gimme that extra chicken finger, I know you swiped one in there,” Gil begged, poking at her overlarge mashed potato pile. She slapped his hand away and pulled a face.

“Even if I _did_ , what makes you think I’d give it to _you_ , asshole?” she snapped back. He made a face right back at her.

“Jerk.”

“Bastard.”

“Well, can I have it, then?” Mathias said from her other side, eyeing her Styrofoam plate with exercise-fed hunger. She snorted.

“As if.” She stopped the approaching fight by stabbing her fork through the camouflaging potatoes and pulling out her stolen fourth finger, tearing off half of it in one bite and grinning through it. The two boys groaned, but went back to their own highly anticipated chicken finger day lunch with the gusto a hot hour under the late summer sun created. Out of all the boys at her table, only one of them wasn’t starving and sweating from practice. Toni and Francis were on the soccer team with Gil, Mathias played outfield for the baseball team, Ivan put his bulk to use on the football team, and Alfred flip-flopped between the latter two and basketball depending on the season. Arthur, sharing the bench with Alfred predictably, was in Liz’s AP Literature class. (There were rumors that he was actually pretty good at soccer, but he absolutely refused to try out and have to spend even _more_ time with his family.)

They were having some argument about a test answer from earlier that day, but everyone could see through the plastic-coated links of the table where their legs were pressed together, hip to ankle. At least they’d officially come out to Liz and she didn’t have to pretend not to notice how handsy they got when they were comfortable.

She took another bite of her speared chicken finger and listened to the table for a bit – Toni and Gil going on about cars, Francis in his Cajun accent clashing with Ivan’s rumble over cigarette brands, and Mathias offered his abrasive opinion into any argument he saw an opening in. She smiled and ate the rest of her chicken finger, washing down the clinging, flaky potatoes with some chocolate milk.

It was always enjoyable to be the token girl for this one half-hour a day, for so many reasons.


	37. With My Brother

It was surprising how many people never realized the connection between Arthur and the boys’ soccer team’s Coach Sean.

Of course, when they were seen separately, they hardly looked alike; Arthur was vaguely scruffy, blond, and vaguely average-looking, while Sean was lean, ginger, and very fit, with carefully kept facial hair and abs you could bounce quarters off of. Separately, you would never be able to guess the two were brothers.

Both of them were ashamed of it. Arthur saw his older brother as a good-for-nothing slacker with a mean streak, and Sean was embarrassed that a blood relative was so boring and grumpy at such a young age. Sean told his players to call him Coach Sean and rarely revealed his last name, and although Arthur had played football back in England and been rather good at it, as soon as Sean signed on to help coach the varsity team, he dropped all dreams and aspirations of striker and stayed as far away from the team as possible.

Even if Arthur had dropped soccer as soon as his brother took charge, the new blood in their school’s stagnant soccer program revitalized the student body, and the promise of getting barked at in a strong Scottish accent had the boys who had previously been iffy about the sport clambering to sign up. Arthur scoffed whenever his brother’s new fans started talking about him in class, but never added a word to the conversation, choosing to bury himself in the closest book or schoolwork instead.

 If, by some stroke of chance, someone did manage to catch them standing next to each other, the relation was obvious. They had the same nose, eyes, a similar smile when Arthur wasn’t scowling and Sean wasn’t grinning, the same skin tone when Sean wasn’t completely covered in dark freckles. Those who knew and remembered would occasionally see glimpses of the other in them. When Arthur got frustrated and ran his hands through his hair, pulling it back from his forehead, the soccer boys blinked and sat up a little straighter, suddenly filled with respect and fear. When Sean got bossy and a bit fussy, Antonio and Gil got a strong urge to do the exact opposite of what he asked (even if they didn’t follow through on that thought).

So, it was a bit surprising that the brotherly link was never noticed, but not entirely unpredictable.


	38. Crimson Glow

Arthur narrowed his eyes at the mirror, picking at the shade of a pimple that was beginning to show on his cheek. It was a Friday early in their junior year, and an after school movie marathon had run late and he’d elected to crash on one of the Jones twins’ double beds instead of going home. He sighed and rubbed at the spot; it was the second one this week. “I hate breaking out,” he groaned, and Al, brushing his teeth next to him, snorted, toothpaste dotting his reflection.

“You call tha’ breakin’ ou’?” He spat into the sink and wiped his mouth with a swipe of his sleeve, leaning back a little to yell down the hall to his brother’s room. “Hey Matt! Come see, Arthur’s ‘breaking out’!”

Arthur glared at him. “What in the hell-”

“Oh _really_ now?” Matt’s voice called sarcastically. “What is it, like, one zit?”

“Worse! _Two!_ ” The twins laughed, too long and too bitter, and Arthur scowled with his hands on his lips.

“I fail to see the humor in this.”

Al sighed and rolled his eyes, still smiling a little, and reached into the shower, taking out a half-empty white bottle. “See this? It’s Matt’n me’s _prescription_ face wash. It’s why all our towels have all those yellow spots on them - it’s got so much stupid peroxide that it _bleaches things_.” He put the bottle back as Matt appeared in the doorway, head ducked down as he put a sweatband around his head to hold his hair away from his face.

“Speaking of which, thanks for reminding me,” he said, elbowing his brother out of the way so he could wipe down his face with the gentle, over-the-counter face wash. He snorted at Arthur’s confusion, making eye contact through the mirror. “We’re supposed to do the whole morning and night thing. I’m worse about keeping to that than Al.” Al shrugged with a grin and leaned against the wall, putting Arthur between him and his brother.

Arthur’s eyebrows furrowed a little, and he actually looked at the twins and their faces. “You know, I never really noticed it before, but I guess you lads do always have a few spots.”

“Yeah, ever since, like, middle school.” Matt patted his face dry and took a small pump from a grey contained by the sink, dabbing it on the red spots on his forehead that were usually covered by hair. “We were the first boys to hit puberty in our grade, see, and we seriously got the short end of every stick.”

“Big feet, cracking voices, awkward hair, the whole nine yards,” Al continued. “Hell, we were barely over eleven!”

Matt took another pump from the spot cream before sliding it down the counter to his twin. “Al got the teasing worse, a’course. Nobody noticed me, especially back in sixth grade, but everyone knew Al.” He grinned. “They used to call him Freddy Freckles sometimes-”

“Hey, shut up!” Matt laughed softly, and Al grinned. “Anyway, it didn’t really last long before the rest of ‘em caught up, and people forgot about it by the time you moved here.” He shrugged at Arthur through the mirror. “Well, the _teasing_ stopped, but this damned acne stuck around and spread. You should see Matt’s back sometimes, it’s godawful.”

“Oh, like yours is any better!”

“It’s the stupid shoulder pads! It’s always worse during football season!”

“Yeah, well I wear ‘em all year round and you don’t see me whinin’!”

“Oi, don’t make me separate you two,” Arthur scolded, shoving the brothers apart before the argument could escalate. “All right, I get it, I won’t complain about a pimple anymore in your presences. Happy?”

“I’m never happy,” Matt snarked, but both of them were back to their usual smiles. Arthur sighed internally and wished he and his own siblings could be as forgiving as these two.

He slid between them and stepped back out into the short hall - three teenaged boys in one bathroom was starting to make him claustrophobic. “Come on, it’s late and I’m tired.” Behind his back, both twins rolled their eyes, but they trailed after him to Al’s bedroom, where Arthur curled on one side of the double bed while Al and Matt sat at the foot, picking up their video game where they’d paused it. Arthur fell asleep to the sounds of dying moans and screeching tires.


	39. Sleep Sweetly

“Hey, you know what I just realized that it’s kinda sad it took me this long to realize?”

Arthur looked up at Al from where he was totally not cuddling into his chest after sneaking into his bedroom to make out on a Thursday night. “What?”

The arm under his neck shifted, held him closer. “We’re the starting quarterback and the student government president. We’re total high school cliché, man.”

Arthur blinked, then snorted. “I doubt the cliché accounts for the gay part.” Al laughed (quietly to avoid waking his brother) and turned to lie on his side, facing Arthur.

“Yeah, well, the times they are’a changin’ and all that.” Arthur smiled at his grin and tucked under Al’s chin into that perfect fit. Al’s sigh shook through his cheek into his bones.

They were quiet for a moment. Al was almost asleep when Arthur softly said, “You forgot that we’re competing for valedictorian against each other, too.”

“Huh?” Al struggled through the heavy sleep blanketing his mind. Arthur rolled his eyes behind closed lids and repeated his statement. Al chuckled.

“Oh yeah, forgot about that.” He grinned and tugged on some of Arthur’s hair with his teeth. “I’m totally gonna beat you, by the way.”

“Over my dead body.” But it was soft and sweet, and Arthur just pulled his hair from biting range and wrapped his arms around Al’s torso to slide closer.

“Hey, you already get to make a speech at graduation ‘cause you’re SGA president, don’t spoil my fun.”

“Making a speech isn’t the least bit fun.”

“Yeah, well, I still want to.”

Arthur sighed. “You’re such a dork.”

“Yeah, but I’m your dork.” Arthur flushed and swallowed the sudden lump in his throat. Thank God Al had put his shirt back on or he’d never hear the end of his burning embarrassment.

“Oh, just go to sleep, you.” Chuckling, Al tangled their legs together and nuzzled into his scalp.

“G’night, president.”

Arthur rolled his eyes again. “Sleep well, quarterback.”


	40. And Held Me In

Their renewal of their first love romance was barely anything like the first go around.

For one, they didn’t see each other every day. They lived in different parts of the state, and could only meet up for weekends and holidays, have the odd phone conversation, texts, an occasional dinner together when Friday was just too far away. It was sweeter, and they had less time to piss each other off. Which was good.

They spent their lessened time together doing different things, too. Although there was still couch cuddling, long drives, drinking together involved, there was also Arthur’s band’s concerts to attend, clubs and bars they’re of age for, mobility they hadn’t been able to afford.

Plus, now they were both more experienced.

And they both lived alone.

Arthur flinched and gasped as he was slammed back against his kitchen table, throat attacked by Alfred’s mouth. He latched arms and legs around him and arched up, baring more of his neck to him as the deep purr of arousal hummed through him. “Ah- just like that, God, yes,” he moaned, holding Alfred closer. Their jeans scratched and stretched between them.

Al grunted and pinned him down with his body, wrenching his head back by the hair to lick a stripe up his neck to the hollow of his chin, pulling at the skin there with his teeth.

Another thing different - or not really, but newly learned - was that they liked the pain.

Arthur used his hold to undulate under him, press up from hip to chest. Al shivered against it and pulled Arthur’s head down to kiss his mouth, force him back into the hard wood of the table. Arthur grinned into it, broke away a little. Enough.

“Fuck me here,” he whispered into his open mouth. Al’s breath stuttered, palms flat against the wood.

“Here?” His voice was rolling, an octave deeper than usual. Not for the first time, Arthur wished he talked more during sex.

He rolled his hips down, dug his heels in. “ _Here_ , big boy.”

Al bit his lip against the clench in his stomach; Arthur could feel it through his open shirt. “Shit, okay.” They kissed again, hard against gums and deep-tongued, before Al pulled away to look down at him, hair hanging in his face and panting. He grinned, then stood straighter to unbutton Arthur’s pants, not bothering yet to unhook his legs. Arthur lifted his hips slightly so he could slip them down, arching back and reaching for a grip on something, anything, an anchor. The bills stacked on the other side of the table cascaded to the ground, but they both ignored them. They had better things to worry about, like getting their clothes off.

Alfred shucked out of his pants, working around and under Arthur’s legs, toeing blindly at his shoes as he bent down to kiss and bite up the open stripe of Arthur’s chest. It didn’t last long, though - Arthur’s jeans were stilled bunched between them, and he almost lost his balance as he tried to stand and seduce on one and a half feet. He gave up on his ankles and his kissing. He grabbed Arthur by the knees, lifted them up and away to balance on his shoulders. Art looked down his chest at him with raised eyebrows, a hidden question. Al shrugged and tugged his bunched pants up higher, uneven, tracing the new shown skin like it was their first time all over again. Arthur’s eyes closed.

As his tuggings reached head height, Al ducked under the pants, but didn’t bother taking them off further, letting them hold Arthur’s legs together behind his head. They smiled at each other, suddenly sappy. At least that hadn’t changed since high school.

Arthur reached up to pull him down for a kiss, hissing and jerking as their cold bare skin sparked and burned. Al braced himself over him and held himself in, reined himself to short, inconsequential thrusts against Arthur’s legs and stomach. Brushes, really.

Oh, air, air. Al pulled back. “What’ve you got that I can get in two steps?” he breathed.

“Not letting you go to get lube.” Arthur wove his fingers deeper into his hair. “Not tonight.”

“Well, that’s great, but that doesn’t answer my question.”

Arthur chuckled. “Persistent bugger, aren’t you.” Al grinned and licked his nose, getting a startled little yelp in response. “Stop that, you’re not a dog!”

Al’s grin turned thirteen years old for a moment. “Not tonight.”

Arthur whacked him hard upside the head, but Al just ducked away from the next blow and laughed. “C’mon, you totally set yourself up for that one.”

“And you’re not getting _shit_ tonight if you don’t grow the fuck up.”  The grin softened under the threat, and Al ducked in to kiss his cheek proper.

“Sorry, honey.” _Trill, trill_. “But seriously, whatcha got?”

“Immature hellion.” But he lifted his knees from Alfred’s shoulders so he could tuck out, using the chance to get his pants off totally. “There’s probably some oil in the bottom cabinet or something.”

Al couldn’t resist another middle school grin. “So we’ll get a good use of your cooking stuff after all!” Pants met face, and he fell to his knees, laughing.

“Hurry the fuck up if you still want to screw me on this table.”

“Oh, keep talking dirty like that, baby, oh baby.” Al dodged the shoe easily and opened the cabinet, rifling through the bottles for the best solution to their needs. He snorted, again, laughed and couldn’t stop.

“Oh, what is it now?” Al turned on his knees and set his chosen glass bottle on the table. Arthur stared at it, sex-ruffled mind sluggish, before it dawned on him. “Lord, you wouldn’t.”

Al cackled again. “Art, I’m gonna make love to you with _extra virgin_ olive oil.”

Arthur groaned and fell back on the table, welcoming the crack of pain on the back of his head. “What did I do in my past life to deserve this.”

“Something _awesome_.” He heard Al stand and make his way back to Arthur’s knees, sliding them apart with a gentleness and leaning into his field of vision.  He smiled, a different grin. “Now what was that you were saying about screwing on the table?”

 Arthur rolled his eyes. “You should be glad I’m so inordinately fond of you.”

A kiss, still humored, but soft. “Every day.” Arthur sighed and wrapped his arms around his neck, pulled him in for a longer kiss, trying to win back the teeth and tongue of earlier. What had he done to deserve this?

They worked their fever back up again, trimming Al’s sentences down and loosening Arthur’s doubled joints. They were gasping again; Alfred slowed.

“Okay?” Arthur nodded, and Al leaned over him to the olive oil bottle. He splashed some on the table as he poured it over his hand, but that didn’t matter. They’d clean it later. He reached down between them, the silk of its taste floating through their air. Arthur’s nails dug into his neck where his hand rested.

“Remember, not tonight.” Al nodded, hand flat. He stroked down Arthur’s abdomen with his palm, strong pressure over his muscle, his cock, his thin hip skin. Arthur groaned. His legs fell to the side, but Al shook his head.

“No, no, not tonight,” he murmured, sliding oiled hands up and down Arthur’s thighs. “I got other plans.”

Arthur smiled as best he could with Al’s hands driving him up the wall. “Oh really.”

Al hummed, gripping Arthur’s knees again and bringing them together in front of his chest. “Really.”

“Well if _that’s_  how you’re going to play it.” Arthur hooked his knees over one of Alfred’s shoulders, crossing his ankles. “I accept.”

Swallow. “Good. That’s good.” He pushed his slick hand between Arthur’s thighs, testing. His eyebrows drew together. “Hmm.”

“What?” Arthur snapped. Al smiled and kissed the nearest part of him - the side of one knee - and slid his legs off his shoulder, crouching down. Arthur sat up, cross and annoyed and flustered, to glare at Al’s head as he rustled around on the floor in their discarded clothes. “What _are_ you doing?”

“Ah-ha!” Al sprang up with his belt pulled from his pants. “Needed this.”

Arthur’s turn to swallow. “ _Oh_.” Al grinned wickedly and pulled him forward just a little, so there was a few inches between the backs of his knees and the table.

“Hold still, honey.” He wrapped the belt under his legs, tightened it. There was a braided weave to it, so he could buckle it tight enough to matter. It pinched, and Arthur’s skin prickled. He slithered back flat on the table. Al smirked. “Did I know you like this?”

“Fuck if I know.” Arthur’s legs were lifted again, knees over the same shoulder, and he was slid forward to the edge of the table. He crossed his ankles again, wished in the back of his mind for a second belt. But he wouldn’t beg for that.

Al’s arm held his legs close, stepping in until his own legs bumped against the table, the curve of Arthur’s ass. He traced nails over Arthur’s skin, tease. Arthur kicked him with the back of his ankle, and he grinned before thrusting in between his thighs.

Alfred tried to angle them together right, finding their new turn. They’d never done it this way before, but if he kept tying Arthur up, Al could experiment all he wanted. He clenched his legs tighter, and the belt slackened around his knees.

Hands gripped hard on the wood, leverage against each other. Al lifted him an inch or two off the table by his grip on his legs, skin connected the whole length back. _Ah_.

“Oh, that’s got it,” Arthur breathed as Al nodded against his knee, braced himself for the rhythm. It was a different sort of burn from their normal sex, all about sensitive skin and holding tight, the tantalize and the close almost as nice as the actual. Al’s breath ghosted, damp and hot, down his legs, leaning on them for support almost as much as he held them up as he canted his hips forward, forward, forward.

Arthur twisted, almost fell. Al caught him, but it was gone anyway. Such a shame.

“Fuck,” Al said, holding still, cock still between Arthur’s inner thighs.

Arthur gasped, flicking hair out of his eyes. When had it gotten sweaty? “This won’t last.”

“Yeah.” Shiver up. Arthur lamented as Al reached up to undo the belt, let his legs fall free. He rolled up with the motion, though, and locked Al in with them. The ties were nice, but this symmetry was nicer.

They wrapped together and kissed again, it had been too long. Arthur held him close again, oil and hard between them. Cloying olives clung to the skin.

Al hummed into his mouth, wrapped one hand around Arthur’s waist while the other pinched between them. “‘Like this better, anyway,” he rumbled, hand slipping around both of their cocks. Arthur responded by moving down to suck at his neck in encouragement, urging his internal fire back up into its coils around his bones from where it had evaporated during the shifting. Alfred tilted his head to the side to give him more room, hand moving in time with Arthur’s tongue. He moaned, squeezed. Arthur thrusted minutely into his hand. Then his tongue _drummed_ , quickly, backforthback, and Al’s thumb flicking over his tip at the time did the same.

“ _Ah!_ ” Oh.

His movements weren’t minute anymore, bucking up into the pace he’d built and riding it, burying into where he’d been kissing and clinging for all he was. There was a romanticism to it. He wove his feet, his calves, around Al’s thighs, arched off the table, Al stumbled a step back, but held, held, turned carefully to find a wall and press Arthur up against it.

He smiled against Al’s neck. “No soft surfaces tonight, love?”

“ _Shit_ no.” They laughed into their kiss, all tongue and lips this time. This time, Arthur was the one to reach down between them, lacing together their fingers and pumping as Alfred kept them up, kept his head. Not for long.

Al’s legs shook as he came, barely a grunt, and Arthur was quick to let his feet fall so he could hold him up, not crash to the floor. It wasn’t like they were drunk.

Alfred’s closing presence, draping to his skin, quaked through Arthur, finger to toe, and he let his orgasm rock him. For a moment, they were coming together.

Al kissed him through the aftershocks, both of them jerking in the glow and sated, smiling. Arthur cupped his neck.

“Come, my dear,” he said, stroking his chin lightly. “Let’s get into bed before I pass out.”

Al grinned. “Your bed’s totally gonna smell like an Olive Garden tomorrow.”

“Yes, well.” His hands slid down to hold Al’s wrists and drag him away, towards his bedroom. “That’s what detergent is for.”

Al followed like a smitten puppy, bright eyes and dull teeth as he bit at his ear from behind. Arthur slapped at him, but held in the no distance and didn’t bother to close the door behind him.

Yes, their relationship was _very_ different now.


	41. No More Pills

Matthew looked up from where he was curled up on the couch watching _Toddlers and Tiaras_ with a 2-liter of Canada Dry and a straw at his brother, who had one eyebrow raised and trying not to laugh. “What do you want.”

“You need anything? Blanket, maybe? Chicken soup for the soul? Your teddy bear?” Al cooed, poking him in the cheek. Matt slapped him away.

“Not from you, bitch.” Al laughed and sat down heavily on the couch next to him, trying to take the remote, but Matt snatched it away before he could change the channel. He glared at him and curled up around the remote, eyes drifting closed.

He woke up three hours later, TV still on TLC, under two afghans with his stuffed bear Kuma tucked under his arm and the ginger ale safely set on the coffee table, next to a bowl with steam coming through the paper towel laid over the top.


	42. Glory Glory

“Where did you even _find_ sheets like that?” Arthur asked, grimacing as he pulled a length of the makeshift ‘toga’ hanging off Alfred tight to see the pattern - mostly made up of stars, stripes, ridiculous patriotic slogans, and shirtless men. Al grinned at him, face permanently red.

“Matt found it, actually, at the fabric store when Mei dragged him there for some costume anime thing. He said he’d pay me twenty bucks to wear it for toga day!”

Arthur let the fabric drop, wiped his hands of the lingering stench of awful, and readjusted his own red sheet toga. “You should’ve asked for fifty, love.”


	43. Pickin' Fights

Matthew Jones was a calm person. He prided himself on his agreeable nature, his ability to get along with people from all walks of life. Some called him a pushover, but he preferred the term ‘mediator’. He was never the one to spark a conflict, or even contribute to one once flamed.

Except for that one day where he started a fight in the science hall.

It was between class late in his junior year, and Matt and Ivan were fighting through the hallway together from their shared fifth period physics class to their English class, talking about the Stanley Cup playoffs. Nothing special, a normal day in the high school life. Matt saw his twin heading perpendicular to him and waved, but he was too preoccupied with flirting heavily with Arthur to notice. Typical. He rolled his eyes with a smile, but the three senior boys walking in front of him had other ideas.

“God, what a bunch of fucking queers.” Matt stiffened; Ivan stopped talking about the Senators.

”Ugh, it’s those two again, isn’t it? Faggots just need to get a girl or something-“

“ _Excuse me._ ” Matt grabbed the nearest one’s sleeve, jerking him back to a stop and grabbing his and his buddy’s attention. “But you might want to think about what you say in public.”

The senior made a face in disbelief, shaking his arm out of Matt’s hold. “Why should I? S’not like _they_ care what we normal people have to see-“

Matt punched him in the face.

He went down, half from shock and half from force; one of his buddies caught him while the other growled and went for Matt, who had already dropped his backpack and set his feet. He came in raring; Matt ducked under and shoved his shoulder into his gut, lacrosse training kicking in. The other two were up again, but Ivan grabbed the instigator around the neck in a chokehold before they could get at Matt while the second - obviously the smartest - booked it.

“You need to remember your size, not just your status,” Ivan said to him, two inches and fifteen pounds more than the senior, before tossing him to the ground.

By this point they’d developed a ring, cheering and jibing mixed with those frustrated kids who just didn’t want to be tardy. Matt was wrestling his senior on the ground, snarling and pulling and kicking, while Ivan kept his weight on the instigator’s chest and scolded him like a grandfather.

_“THAT’S ENOUGH!”_

The sudden bellows ceased all talk and movement in the hallway. The principal, a big guy himself, pushed through the quickly dispersing ring, his usually cheery disposition sour. The four of them stood quickly, wiping at injuries and staring at the ground.

Dr. Vargas crossed his arms. “My office, all of you.” They nodded, collected their scattered bags and books, and followed him sullenly, hunching away from the peering eyes and dreading the future of ISS and grounding.

(Al found out about the fight next period and sent twenty frantic texts to Matt until he was able to answer.

He never told him exactly why he got in a fight with three guys he’d never spoken to without his twin able to back him up. Matt passed it off as Ivan’s fault, and Al didn’t question that.)


	44. Chaotic Daisy

Matt waved Ivan, his ride home from lacrosse practice, goodbye from his front yard and hummed as he headed inside. It had been a good day so far for no reason, and even the truck in the driveway that said Al was home couldn’t put a damper on his mood.

He unlocked the front door quietly, dumping his dirty socks in the laundry hamper in the belowstairs closet before heading up, looking forward to a nice hot shower and - was that giggling?

Matt froze and listened. Yes, definitely giggling, and cloth moving, and - oh _no_ , he’d finally come home to every teenager’s worst nightmare - his parents having sex! He slumped against the wall and groaned silently, but then frowned as the gears in his mind clicked together. No, his parents’ room was downstairs, and neither of their cars were outside, just his and Al’s truck-

Oh. Oh _no_. Oh, this was far, far worse.

But he couldn’t back away now. He carefully set his bag down on a stair and crept up, crawling up the stairs until he could just see over the top one into - oh, of _course_ Al hadn’t closed his door all the way.

There, through the cracked door, was the one image that Matthew would remember onto his death. His line of sight didn’t include their heads, but he could see the bed, a knee bent up - denim on it, thank every god - next to a familiar ass, also still clothed but barely, leaving ample backskin showing as a paler hand held up the shirt.

Well, at least it could be confirmed that Al was on top, at least some of the time.

Shift, and Arthur’s bare foot slammed up on Al’s back to yank him down, and Matt could just make out the ends of Al’s hair tossed around by wild fingers.

Barely breathing, he adjusted his spot backwards just enough to see heads as Al ducked down, face in Arthur’s neck, and Arthur’s eyes were closed and he was _smiling_ like nothing Matt had ever seen before.

He quickly ducked back out of sight to think. It’d probably be hilariously awkward to make his presence known now… but he’d been keeping a close eye on them lately, and he could tell that things were rougher between them than before. He wouldn’t ask about it if one of them didn’t speak first, but he could let them have their better moments together uninterrupted. He could shower downstairs, just this once.

He pulled out his phone and got a compromising picture before slinking back down the stairs. Just because he was giving them peace didn’t mean he should waste a perfectly good opportunity for future blackmail. Besides, Gil had been pestering him for one for months.


	45. Good Enough

When Arthur had been thirteen for not even half a year, hurricane season hit the mid-Atlantic Ocean harder than recorded history. Hurricane Katrina tore the Gulf Coast apart, leaving flooded homes and hundreds of thousands without home or health care. Arthur’s father, an emergency room surgeon with a history of EMT work, saw just the right episode of _Top Gear_ and got his one true calling to help those most in need at the time. Arthur’s mother, used to his humanitarian efforts, sighed and entertained him, but the bug refused to go away.

Before Arthur was fourteen, he had packed up his wife, his five sons, and some personal effects and moved them down to Dixie.

They arrived in Baton Rouge during the Christmas holiday to muggier air and dead grass and slowly settled into their new house, situated firmly in a town about halfway between the two major cities of Louisiana. Mr. Kirkland got right to his work, elbows deep in emergency care before any of the rest of his family could sneeze. They started unpacking and exploring this strange new world where people drove on the wrong side of the car and the street and slurred the ends of their words. Before long, though, it was time for the boys to go to school.

Arthur showed up to his first day of year eight - _eighth grade_ , they called it _eighth grade_ here - with a backpack and a class schedule in his jacket pocket. The front desk secretary smiled at him as he passed - he had met her when his mother had taken him up earlier to learn the ropes - and was directed by her towards the gymnasium. Eighth graders started their day in PE, then went to their elective, then the rest of the day was spent in three ninety minute academic classes.

He walked into the gym and was greeted with the raucous cries of boys from one side, girls from the other, and faltered before marching on to the only adult men in the room - two of them, who wore the athletic gear and clipboard of coaches.

“Excuse me?” He tapped the shorter one on the arm for his attention. “I’m supposed to be in here, I’m... new.” The coaches’ expressions, confused at first, brightened. The shorter one nudged the taller with his shoulder.

“And you thought that I’d forgotten one of my kids.”

“Well, it’s about that time for your memory loss, ain’t it?” They laughed, and Arthur stuck his fists in his pockets hard. The shorter one smiled down at him.

“So, you’re that name I didn’t recognize on my roster, huh? Well, I’m Coach Richardson, and this is Coach Furlong. And you’re...” He went to flip through the papers on his clipboard, but Arthur beat him to it.

“Arthur Kirkland, sir.”

“Thought it was something like that.” He drew his eyebrows together and inspected his new charge. “Where you from?”

“Uh, England. Devon, exactly.” A discordant bell rang throughout the room; the kids chattering away around them scurried to their locations. Coach Furlong waved and ran to his bleachers; Coach Richardson jerked his head in an indication for Arthur to follow him across the gym.

“Well, you’ll be welcome here. These are good kids.” He scanned the boys milling about in his section of bleacher. “I’ve got them sitting in alphabetical order for roll call, so you’ll slip in...” He pointed at a spot three rows up. “Next to that blond boy in the glasses.”

A few of the boys had pulled their attention away from their conversations enough to recognize someone they didn’t know standing next to their coach, then started chattering about who it could be. Coach Richardson blew his whistle, and they all snapped to attention.

“Welcome back to school, boys! Since it’s the first day of the semester, it’s a Mattball day!” A general cheer went up from the class. “Also, you’ve got a new student joining y’all today. His name is Arthur, and he’s from England.” He put a hand on Arthur’s shoulder, and Arthur shuffled on his feet. “So be nice.”

“C’mon, Coach, we’re _always_ nice!” a strange-looking boy with white hair and red eyes said from the front row. Coach Richardson snorted, then shoved Arthur along. He carefully skirted the crowd, who were all staring at him, and went to sit at the spot that had been pointed out to him. The blond boy in the glasses smiled.

The coach started to call out names, and Arthur’s neighbor turned to him. “So, you’re really from England?”

He blinked. “Yes, of course.” The boy’s face brightened.

“That’s so cool!”

“Matthew?” The boy jerked.

“Here!”

“And Arthur, I know you’re here.” Coach Richardson smiled and passed on further down the roster, and Matthew’s attentions came back to him.

“So you’re Matthew?”

“Or Matt. Whatever you like.” He shrugged, then leaned forward a little more. “So why are you _here_?”

Arthur’s mouth opened, closed, opened. “M’dad’s work.”

“Ooooh. Cool.” He sat back, and Arthur breathed easier. Americans had no sense of boundaries. “So what’s your schedule like?”

Arthur pulled out his paper schedule and was poring over it with Matt when the end of the roll call was heralded with a mass exodus of the boys to the locker room. Arthur watched and followed suit, leaving his backpack in the bleachers. The coach caught him on the way into the locker room.

“So, since it’s your first day I’m not gonna make you dress out, but let’s get you in a locker and with some gym clothes so you’ll be ready next time. All right?” Arthur nodded and let himself be led away.

A few minutes later they were back in the gym, the rest of the class in shorts and T-shirts and dragging around some wrestling mats to form the corners of a square. The other boy gym class joined them, while the girls had vanished to some other corner of the school.

Matt fell in step beside him, and they talked their way up the bleachers to a spot at the top. Far below them, the game started.

“Aren’t you supposed to be down there?” Arthur asked after a while. Matt shrugged.

“Eh, they don’t seem to notice me most of the time, so might as well take advantage of it. It’s better than being called Al, anyway.” He pulled a face, and Arthur cocked his head in question. Matt sighed. “I’m a twin.”

“Wow. Really?”

“Yep. Actually...” He gestured for Arthur’s schedule again, and frowned at it when given. “Yep. You’ve got lunch period with him. English, Thomas.” He put his hands on both Arthur’s shoulders. “I am so sorry.”

Arthur couldn’t help it; he snorted. Matt smiled and took his hands away. “Nah, Al’s really not that bad, just kind of loud sometimes. Now _Gil_ , that’s the kid you gotta worry about.”

“Who’s Gil?”

Matt and Arthur spent the rest of the PE period going over the other boys in the grade - who to avoid, who to make friends with, the smart ones, the ones that all the girls loved - until the call came from the coaches to dress in.

Matt wasn’t in Band class with him next period, but he’d given him pointers on what to do, and he faced this next teacher of his with much more confidence.

Maybe this American school wouldn’t be so bad after all.

The day passed quickly, a whirl of faces, names, and classes, until it was lunch time. He followed Matt’s twin brother, Al, who had somehow talked to Matt with twin telepathy or something throughout the day and was told to show him the ropes of the cafeterias and the sweet-talking necessary with the lunch ladies.

Food was chicken fingers - a favorite meal - and the students were clamoring for extras, but Al scooted Arthur past the masses and led him to a round table that looked like all the others, but was somehow theirs. It had been explained to Arthur how classes sat together, not friends, so he wasn’t surprised to see familiar faces from his English class already there.

Arthur hadn’t been sure what to expect from this new school. He’d heard horror stories about bullying and shunning that happened, and classes and schools were put together in such a bizarre fashion over here that it was amazing he wasn’t trying to walk on the ceiling yet from how much his head was spinning. But the novelty of a new student - from _another country_ , no less - proved too powerful for anyone to be mean to him, and he had been wildly accepted by everyone - almost _too_ accepted. He couldn’t go anywhere without being bombarded with questions about his background, his family, and himself.

Lunch was no exception. He barely even sat down before one of the intensely curious kids asked the eternal question.

“Are you really from _England?_ ”

He opened his mouth to answer, but before he could speak, Al did. “Yo, dude, give him some space! He just got here, chill.” The questioner settled down, and Arthur sighed and started eating his mashed potatoes, content to listen to the others’ conversation and figure out who everyone was.

Al bumped into him lightly with his arm, beaming at him when he looked up. (While Matt and Al were both blond and blue-eyed, they were fraternal twins, so it wasn’t _too_ hard to tell him apart from the twin from this morning. The very different personalities didn’t hurt, either.)

“Sorry about all the attention today, Art. I don’t think we’ve had a new kid, since, like, two years ago. It’s weird, for us.”

“You think it’s weird for _you?_ ” Al laughed, and a few of their eavesdroppers joined in. Al nudged him again.

 “Y’know, you’re all right.” Arthur raised his eyebrows at him, and he laughed again.

“I guess I’m supposed to take that as a compliment?”

“Duh!” He stuck half a chicken finger in his mouth. “Don’ worry, Ar’, wif me’n Ma’ aroun’ ta help ya ou’, no one’ll ge’on your bad side!” Arthur made a face as he sent food flying everywhere by talking while chewing.

“Stop that! And it’s Ar _thur_ , not ‘Ar’ or ‘Art’!”

Al just grinned cheekily at him and swallowed.

* * *

At the end of the day, Arthur waved goodbye at the twins and the other friends he’d made that were still waiting for his parents as he got into the backseat of his mother’s car. As she pulled away from the curb, she smiled at him through the rear view mirror.

“So, how was your first day?”

Arthur stared out the window at the strange trees of Louisiana, still not quite familiar, and smiled. “Good enough.”


	46. Life is a Game

****Matt knew he shouldn’t have gone to the one ice rink in the area the day before a lacrosse game, but dammit he’d had a free day _and_ the truck, so of course he’d gone with Ivan for some healthy beating-each-other-into-the-wall therapy time. But now it was telling on him, because his well-learned muscle movements, so different from ice to grass, were all out of line, and for the first time in a while he felt unsure with a stick in his hand.

He didn’t have time to reflect or to fix it, though - the game was on, the team was good, and a storm was rollin’ in from the distant Gulf -

He checked someone hard enough to knock them against the glass, but there _wasn’t_ any glass, and instead they both went toppling, rolling into each other and his facemask was wrenched unpleasantly and that was a _cleat_ -

Dizzy black and white noise fizzled into stormy blue sky and face masks. He felt faint and painful and lightheaded and triumphant all at once, and he couldn’t really figure out why that last one was there. He tried to smile to reassure... whoever was above him, and a searing shot ripped from his mouth to his brain, and he groaned as others gasped. Throbbing started, centered around his lower left mouth. His face and chin felt wet.

“Did...” He licked his lips and found a rip down there. Huh. “Did I get ‘im?”

Laughter, shaky, a push at his shoulder. “Yeah, dude, that was fuckin’ _sick!_ ” Chatter started.

“Hey, move it, boys!” A female voice shrieked from behind the wall of masks. _Mom_.

“Baby, are you okay?” She fell to her knees beside him, and fingers started touching his face, wrestling his helmet all the way off. Sudden air, that felt nice. “Oh, your _face_ , Mattiebear!” He didn’t even notice the petname he hated, although some of the masks - teammates - laughed behind gloves.

“Hey Mom.” _Wince_. “Ow.”

Her hair whipped up. “Will one of you useless things get him off this damned field before I have to beat you to do it?” It was her drill sergeant voice, and they rightly snapped to. Hands appeared at his shoulders, heaving him to his feet, and he had to close his eyes against the vertigo as he was led away to the sidelines. Distantly, he heard cheering.

(He ended up needing three stitches in his lip that left him with an impressive scar, losing the tooth below that, and suffering a concussion that left him lurching for a week, but hey, they won the game in the end.)


	47. Sun's Sure Shining

“Whoa, Hedevary, you have a _lot_ of hair.”

Liz looked up through said hair, which was currently flipped over and hanging upside-down so she could pull it into a high ponytail, at her (male) softball coach. “Uh. Yeah?”

“Well, I mean, I _knew_ that, but that…” He gestured vaguely with his hands and jerked his head forward. “It just _looks_ bigger that way.”

Liz laughed and finished tying up her hair, straightening and whipping her new ponytail against her spine. “Well, if that’s supposed to be a good thing, then thank you.” She sat down in the grass to double-tie her clears, and her coach chuckled and turned away to his other players.


	48. Picture in her Purse

Matt and Mei were slow dancing at the edge of the floor towards the end of the night, watching friends and classmates of all variety flow around them. Mei was leaning as high up his chest she could get - even in her four inch heels, she was over a head shorter. At a table in the far corner, Al and Arthur were talking in low voices, and Matt’s experience with them told him it was a fight he couldn’t break up. Maddie and Bridget had left a while ago, not planning on coming to their close friends’ afterparty/sleepover. They had their own plans instead. Gil and Liz were being surprisingly cute; Mei smiled as Gil adjusted her Prom Queen crown on her head, then looked away when she got flustered.

“Having a good time?” Matt asked, his voice rumbling through her more than she heard it over the music. She looked up, his glasses-less eyes crinkled.

“Of course! Got the best looking man on the dance floor with me, don’t I?” He snorted, flushed, and she giggled. “You should get your hair cut more often.” She reached up on her toes to ruffle it, newly shorn and styled. He shook it back into place.

“No way, I _like_ being the less-noticed twin.” She wrinkled her nose at him, hand resting against the side of his clean-shaven face.

“You should at least wear your contacts more. It’s nice.”

“But they feel so _weird_!”

She patted his cheek and dropped her hand back to his shoulder. “You’ll get over it.”

The song changed into something fast, and they quickly stepped to the side to avoid getting trampled by those who had obviously pre-gamed. Matt glanced anxiously over at Arthur and Al again. It looked more like yelling now. “I should go over there and break it up.”

“Give it a minute.” She wrapped his arms around her and leaned back into him, making him sway in place. He sighed and gave in.


	49. Hour To Live

The actual graduation was a chaotic vortex of too much blue, trying to keep their heads perfectly straight, and Matt texting from the main audience through most of it. Arthur, Al and Liz couldn’t, since they’d all ended up sitting on the stage for various reasons (Al was valedictorian like he’d planned, Arthur was the SGA president, and Liz was the National Honor Society president because no one else had wanted to be). They got to sit still and look interested under too-hot lights for too long, and even the always-colorful speech of their principal wasn’t enough to keep them entertained. Al got to make his precious speech, though, where he thanked all the people that shouldn’t be thanked and left a bitter impression in some choice administrator’s mouths, but it wasn’t anything newspaper worthy. They got their diplomas, they walked across the stage, and they left as fast as they damned well could, shedding their caps and gowns and dumping them with the school counselors to be returned to the company they’d been rented from. Their group was headed to Liz’s house for their personal afterparty, with dinner made by some of the parents and a swingset in the backyard.

While families filtered over slowly from the auditorium where their graduation had been held, the recent graduates themselves hid in the backyard, swinging away in their nice clothes.

“Y’know, that’s probably the last time we’re gonna see a lot of those people,” Liz said, pumping her legs to get as high as the swingset would let her. Matt, leaning against the support of the set, shrugged.

“Oh well. Their loss.” Al barked a laugh from the porch-style swing next to Liz, and Arthur laughed quietly next to him. Their laughter quickly faded, though, and they looked anywhere but at each other. Matt and Liz exchanged a glance over her sunglasses and sighed.

“Well, at least we’re officially out now. Feels kinda weird.” Liz slowed down in her pumping so she could climb up to swing standing.

“Yeah, probably won’t hit us for a while.” The clatter and voices of new people floated out from the open back door - probably Francis, Toni, and Gil, who’d planned on “crashing” the party even though they’d been invited. Matt smiled and shook his head.

“I’ll go make sure those jerks don’t break anything,” he said, pushing off of his perch and heading towards the door. Al clambered to follow him, barely saying anything to Arthur before he left him; Matt shakes his head again and goes inside.


	50. This Goddamned Box

Liz spun on her stool - she wasn’t even supposed to be sitting in the box office, but screw it, the general manager wasn’t in the building - and groaned. “ _God_ , why is it so _boring_ today.”

“I dunno.” Adrienne, her coworker/partner in suffering on this Saturday morning, had her cheek propped up on her hand and phone in front of her face. “The set doesn’t even start for another half hour.”

Liz groaned louder and laid her head down on her counter. “ _Boooored_.”

“Mmm.” They fell silent, Adrienne absorbed in her phone. Eventually Liz turned her head to the side and entertained herself with a forgotten receipt stub, ripping it to shreds then folding the bits even smaller.

“Oh, okay, ready, gay or not gay.”

Liz perked up instantly at the mention of her favorite work game - trying to identify the orientation of couples coming up. (If you did it before they said anything you got double points.)

As soon as she saw the two boys walking up, though, she couldn’t help it. She cracked up into helpless hysterics, sliding off her stool to the floor and clutching at the legs for support. Adrienne asked about her wellbeing, but the customers got to her window before she could get an answer.

“Hey, uh - is Liz here? I could’ve sworn I saw her just now...”

“Liz, get _up!_ ” Adrienne got to her feet so she could help Liz to hers, whose eyes were still streaming.

“Liz, are you okay?” Al had his worried face on, while Arthur next to him just tilted his head to the side and drew his eyebrows together.

“Fine- I’m fine. Just. Good joke.” She took a few deep breaths to steady herself. “Anyway, not important. What’s up, boys?”

“Not much, just hopin’ you could do your movie magic and get us in free.” Al winked and snapped finger-guns at her, and she laughed again, stomach hurting.

“Sure, Al. Anytime.” She jerked her head towards the main doors, and they went in while she ducked out the box office door to wave them through to Lateesha at the podium.

When she came back to her stool, Adrienne pulled a face. “What the hell, Liz.”

Liz grinned. “They’re friends of mine. And they’ve been dating for four months.”

“Oh. _Ooooooh_.”

“Yeah.”

Adrienne puckered her lips and raised her eyebrows. “Cheater.”

“Yup.” People were starting to filter in from the nearby shopping center, and the incident with Al and Arthur was forgotten in the afternoon rush.


	51. Still Sweet

Early February in their Louisiana high school meant pink in the hallways, pink/white/red color coordinations on the girls, muggy-but-still-cold wind chills outside, and a whole lot of mess over nothing.

Arthur plopped down in his chair in AP Environmental Science and groaned, throwing down the small square of red paper on the lab table. “I _hate_ February.”

Al looked up from where he was furiously filling out the worksheet they were supposed to be handing in that class period. “Good morning to you, too!”

“Ha ha.” Arthur sneered at him and pulled out his own worksheet - finished the class period before - and growled at the offending red slip. “If I never have to see any of the hapless reps had out these _stupid_ flyers in class changes again, I’d be a happy man.”

Al bit back his grin and propped up on his elbow to better focus on Arthur’s freckles. “Art, you’re the SGA president. This is _your_ fundraiser.”

“That doesn’t mean I _like_ this!” He threw the flyer in the air and sat back hard. “I don’t _like_ having to force flowers and all this love crap on everyone! I don’t _like_ having to depend on at least a hundred of these damned things being sold to even buy the flowers, I _really_ don’t like having to fight with the florist to get flowers that don’t fall apart before delivery! And, the kicker is, I don’t even get one of these blasted things sent to me!” He groaned low in his throat and collapsed on his arms, spent from his little outburst. Al patted him gingerly on the back, chewing on his lip.

“I’ll buy one for you if you buy one for me.”

Arthur peeked at him with one eye. “I beg your pardon?”

“Y’know, if you’re feeling left out or something. I’d send you one.” He jerked his eyes away before he could gauge Arthur’s reaction, trying to remember where he was in his worksheet.

“Well, that’s… sweet, I guess.” Arthur chuckled, and Al’s ears burned. “I was just complaining to complain, though, I don’t really _need_ one to make me feel better. Carrying around a carnation all day… I appreciate the sentiment, really, Al, but I don’t need your pity flower.”

“It wouldn’t be pity!” That came out a little louder than expected. Al coughed and stared at his worksheet. “I mean, I wouldn’t just do it to make you look silly, or anything like that.”

“... Al?”

The bell rang, saving Al’s ass, and their teacher swept in from her post outside in her characteristic promptness, and fuck it, Al’s just gonna have to turn this in unfinished.

Arthur gave him weird looks for the rest of the class period, and they parted ways after with only a nod.

Two weeks later, though, Arthur had a white carnation with scalloped pink edges with his name attached to it waiting in the bucket for his first period class.


	52. Marinating

Unlike Alfred, Arthur knew he liked boys from the start.

That doesn’t mean that he did anything about it, though, or even thought it was that out of the box. He had equal amounts of childhood crushes on girls and boys, but since he acted on neither, being grumpy and awkward from a young age, no one noticed. He was naturally reclusive with his feelings, and the subject simply never came up when he cared.

He lasted until secondary school (high school? Ah, fuck it) without confronting his middle-of-the-road tendencies. Since his new school was set in the traditionally conservative American South, he got minor exposure to the trains of thought that trended in the area, and he started paying attention to his tendencies. Hormones and introversion warred with his fascination with pretty girls and strong boys alike, and he forcefully pushed the issue away.

But he spent too much time putting off caring about it; it wasn’t long before Al (one of his many secret flash-in-the-pan adolescent crushes) took a shine to him and sped-delivered his decision on what to do.


	53. Reckless Rampant

It was before classes started for the day, those blissful few minutes when everyone got to stand around in the hallways and squeeze in some precious moments of talk without distraction. Arthur was standing in front of a seated Gil and Francis, lecturing as he was wont to do while Gil egged him on and Francis wished dearly for a cigarette. (Silly federal non-smoking laws.) As it was, he had his bleary eyes fixed away from Arthur and so saw the Jones twins approached, Matt resigned and Al stalking.

“For the love of God, Gil, you are _not_ allowed to operate _any_ machinery during a school event - _oof!_ ”

He was cut off by Al’s lift from behind, feet clearing the ground in a bear hug. Al grinned at him and kissed his temple, barely. “Mornin’, sunshine.”

Arthur recovered from the initial shock like a champ and reached back to pat Al’s cheek. “Hello, Alfred.”

Dramatic retching called their attention away from each other. Gil had fashioned Francis’s scarf, briefly stolen, into a noose and was miming hanging; Francis was too amused at everyone involved to wrestle it back just yet; and Matt had pulled his hood up and drawstrings tight to hide his shame. Al set Arthur back down on his feet and stepped away, red-faced, and Arthur scowled at Gil before kicking him in the shin.

“ _Ow!_ ”

“Insensitive prick.”

“Hey, are we kicking Gil? I want in!”

“Go to hell, Liz!” Gil yelled at her as she crossed the hallway. She stuck out her tongue and sat next to Francis as Al and Arthur wandered away together and Matt curled up as best he could manage with his gangly frame on Gil’s far side.

“Did I miss anything?”

“Jus’ oah’ rezdent fools’n love drippin’ honey battah’ ever’wheah,” he said low, jerking his head towards Al and Arthur, who were sitting shoulder to shoulder against a different locker bank, talking in quiet voices. Al’s hand was mysteriously hidden behind Arthur’s slightly exposed lower back.

“Aw, how precious.”

Matt huffed from next to the wounded Gil. “Speak for yourself, I’m _related_ to that.”

They laughed, and the conversation flipped until the warning bell rang. As she was changing out her books for calculus, though, she glanced over at Al and Arthur’s lockers just in time to see Arthur’s finger, discreet unless you looked, trace a line over the waistband of Al’s jeans that made him blush and shake. Arthur grinned, and Liz looked away before they could catch her staring.


	54. Passion Grabbed Me

The morning after prom night, Gil and Liz finally left their friend circle’s overnight in the abandoned-garage-turned-venue owned by one of Arthur’s older brothers so Gil could escort her home. The spell of the night before still lingered, keeping them civil and smiling, but they were both just waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Gil pulled up to the street in front of her house and threw the car in park. “Uh. So.”

“Yeah.”

They stared at their hands. Gil’s leg twitched; Liz chewed on her tongue.

“Fuck it all,” she said under her breath. Gil looked up in time for her to grab his face (a little hard) and smash their mouths together.

“Mmph!” He flailed a bit, but then caught a hank of her trailing hair and twisted his fingers in it, other hand going up to the back of her head.

She’d squeezed her eyes shut on the attack, but when Gil cradled her head and slowed it down, she relaxed, sighing and letting him take over, since he obviously knew a bit more about kissing than her.

She turned a little in her seat, knees pressed to the middle console, and ran her hands down his neck, feeling his skin jump under her fingers. She smiled, and he took his chance to pry her mouth open wider and slip his tongue in.

“Oh!” Her small cry broke them apart, and why was she breathing so hard, anyway? But he was panting, too, so it was okay.

Their foreheads knocked together, and Gil rested his on hers, eyes still closed. (She peeked to make sure.) “Well, hello there.”

She couldn’t help it; she giggled, then outright laughed, fingers gripped in his too big T-shirt. He laughed, a bit more breathless, and held her close.

When she trailed off, she finally opened her eyes to find Gil staring at her. “Let’s do that again sometime?”

She didn’t need an invitation. She tugged him forward to kiss him again, head turned sideways and mouth open from the start, inviting his tongue because she thought it’d felt nice the first time but wanted to double-check. His exhale skittered over her cheek but he went with it, pressing his tongue against hers, tilting to dovetail best.

This time they broke slowly, butterfly touches across her face that made her ache. She could feel his smile against her skin.

“That’s nice- awesome, great, not what I meant.” He was using that deep voice again, the one he’d asked her to prom with and pulled out of nowhere in one of the slow dances last night. She shivered. “I meant, like, _later_. Over multiple days. For a long-ass time. And not in my car. Well, not in my front seat.” The corner of his mouth quirked, and her blood hammered in her ears.

“Gilbert Beilschmidt, are you asking me out?”

The hand behind her head gripped harder. “Maybe?”

She gave him a peck on the nose. “Then you’ll get a ‘maybe’ answer.”

“ _Yes!_ ” She jumped. “Yeah, I- I wanna kiss you more, and, uh, pay for your food and shit, pick you up from softball practice and dance with you some more and mayb-”

She closed his mouth by pushing up his jaw with her hand, his white skin making his blush fire instead of rose. “You know it’s really dumb to do this a month before graduation, right?”

He huffed. “Yeah, well, you hated me until last night, so when else was I supposed to do this?” She grazed her manicure over his throat; he closed his eyes and sighed, almost purred. “What I - what I’m _saying_ is that I wanna try if you wanna try, ‘Liz’beth. _That’s_ what I’m saying.”

She hummed. “All right.” Such a small moment. Gil’s eyes popped open. “We can try.”

He beamed at her and crushed her awkwardly in a hug that including her seatbelt. “Hell yeah, let’s do this!”

She laughed and extracted herself so she could unbuckle and climb out of the car. He hurried to turn the car off and clamber after her, meeting her at the trunk as she threw her duffel bag over her shoulder.

“My parents probably think we’re idiots for sitting out here so long.” He shrugged, smiled - he couldn’t stop smiling. (Neither could she.)

“Let ‘em think.” He glanced down the street, then took a step and grabbed her by the waist for their first full-body kiss, sore and foggy. Liz held him close, palms pressed to his spine.

When she pulled away, he had a stupid, happy smile on. “Wanna come over tonight?”

She laughed. “Movin’ a bit fast there, bud.”

He shrugged with his whole body. “Tomorrow, then?”

She examined his eyes. “Yeah, okay.”


End file.
